TECH BYTE: Keep Your Devices From Overheating This Summer

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. (WDEF) — This summer has been especially hot all across the country.

People and pets aren’t the only ones who get hot. Your tech does too.

“The heat with this summer is so important,” said Laurie Starcher, AT&T. “We want to keep our devices at a temperature between 32 and 95 degrees.”

This includes smartphones, tablets, and most smartwatches.

But there are things you can do to keep those gadgets from overheating.

Make sure your device is up to date, for one.

And don’t leave it in a hot car.

Starcher says you should also make sure the brightness on your screen is turned down.

“That’s one way that your battery is kind of being used in a way that we don’t even think about,” she said. “But as you pull the brightness down on your screen, it can really help with that.”

Starcher says it’s also a good idea to charge your device at night.

“Charging your devices in the evening, right, at night while we’re sleeping, while it’s a lot cooler can really be helpful because if you think about it, heat on top of heat, that’s normally not a good formula for our devices.”

So what should you do if your device does overheat, and shuts off?

Starcher says you want to make sure it cools off.

“Sometimes, like when I have long drives especially, and I don’t realize it, maybe it’s been sitting in the sun, on the console, just simply moving it for a period of time out of the sun is actually extremely helpful,” Starcher said. “Just allowing some time for it to cool down can really be the difference between your device overheating, and kind of getting kaput to just, you know, simply needing a pause.”

Another thing to keep in mind – If you need the gadget to cool down, don’t put it in the fridge or freezer to speed up the process. That will only damage it more.

Starcher says you should also turn off Bluetooth.

“Because if we’re having so many devices connected, our phones are really working in overdrive,” she said. “A lot of times we don’t realize how many devices we do have connected to Bluetooth, whether that be our vehicle, our AirPods speakers. There’s so many things. I mean, at my house, we even have our lights connected to our Bluetooth, right? So just turning that off will allow your phone that little bit of rest time, so that way you can recover quicker.”

Some other tips to keep you device from overheating? Avoid extreme temperature changes, and keep multiple wireless devices stored separately.