Phone Won’t Charge? This Easy Trick Might Fix It and Save You Money

You plug the charging cable into your iPhone or Android phone and… nothing happens. Big sigh. From broken or rusted charging ports to damaged power cables, there are plenty of reasons your phone might not charge and not all of them can be easily fixed at home. A common reason for faulty charging is simply that your charging port is clogged with months’ worth of pocket fluff and the cable can’t quite fit in anymore. 

This common problem can happen with any charging port whether that’s Lightning on the iPhone 14 Pro or older iPhones, or USB-C on the more recent iPhone 15 Pro and Android phones like the Google Pixel 8 Pro or Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra.

Thankfully, this is one of the simplest and cheapest charging problems to fix. Here’s how. 

Why is my charging port blocked? 

There are no covers on your phone’s charging port, meaning it’s exposed to every bit of dust, dirt and debris it encounters. Every time you slide your phone into your pocket, your phone will be susceptible to pocket fluff and if, like me, you’ve got pockets filled with detritus from accidentally washing your jeans with old receipts in the pockets, then that’s asking for trouble. And that’s to say nothing of the cookie crumbs. Do not ask me why I have cookie crumbs in my pockets. 

Day by day, this won’t be a problem, but those tiny bits of dust and fluff will build up over the months or years you have your phone, compacting together each time you plug in your charging cable until it forms a solid barrier that stops your charger from going all the way in and allowing it to connect and charge. 

If you’ve had your phone for more than six months and you’re gradually finding the charger becoming less and less stable (particularly if you have to wiggle it around to get it to begin charging) then it’s highly likely that dirt in your port is the culprit. 

How to clean out your phone’s…