#Why You Should Regularly Clean Your Phone’s USB-C Port (and How to Do It) – Review Geek

When’s the last time you cleaned your phone’s USB-C port? These ports are constantly exposed to dust, lint, and dirt that can permanently damage your phone or reduce charging performance. Here’s why you need to regularly clean your phone’s USB-C port, plus some steps to get the job done.

Your Phone Wants to Destroy Itself

Alright, Let’s Get to Cleaning!

Cleaning your phone’s USB-C port is easier than you might expect. That said, we’re not going to use the patented isopropyl alcohol and toothbrush combination for this job. That kind of heavy-duty work isn’t necessary here, and alcohol could hurt your phone if its port is already damaged. As for the toothbrush, it might leave plastic bristles in your phone.

And for the love of all that is holy, don’t stick bobby pins or other pieces of metal in any of your phone’s holes. You’ll just scratch up the connectors.

Here are four easy steps to safely clean your phone’s USB-C port:

1. Assess the Mess: Before you start anything, get a bright flashlight to look in your phone’s USB-C port. After all, it’s hard to clean what you can’t see!
2. Start with Compressed Air: Canned air or a canless air duster can get most of the lint and debris out of your phone’s USB-C port. Just remember to spray in short bursts and hold the can upright to avoid getting a bunch of cold liquid all over your phone. (Also, don’t blow in your phone with your mouth. You’ll fill it with moisture.)
3. Use a Plastic Toothpick for Stubborn Debris: Don’t even try to stick cotton swabs or metal objects in your phone’s USB-C port. Instead, use the “toothpick” end of a plastic flosser to dig any stubborn debris out of your phone. Please be gentle doing this—don’t bend the connector inside your port!
4. Finish with Compressed Air: If you dislodge any large debris from your USB-C port with a plastic flosser, be sure to finish the job with compressed air. There may be some lint or dust you missed.

Your phone’s USB-C port should be clean now. If the port still feels crunchy when you plug in a cable, you may want to repeat the cleaning process or check that your charging cable isn’t dirty.

Did your phone have trouble charging before you cleaned it? If it’s still having trouble, I suggest visiting a repair professional. The port’s connector may be tarnished or bent and in need of repair or replacement.

How to Keep Your Port Clean In the Future

You should regularly clean your phone’s USB-C port to prevent dust, lint, and other debris from piling up. But let’s be honest, you don’t really want to clean a charging port every few weeks. That’s why you should build some simple habits to keep the crap out of your phone’s port—I swear it’s easy!

Here are some easy things you can do to keep your phone USB-C port clean:

• Wash Your Clothes: The insides of your pockets shouldn’t be full of lint, dirt, sand, or small pieces of disintegrated trash. Empty out those pockets and turn your pants inside-out when you wash them. Also, make sure to clean the lint trap every time you use a clothes dryer—otherwise, it won’t trap lint! (Lint buildup also makes dryers less efficient and can start fires.)
• Clean Your Purse or Bag: Are you carrying lint, sand, tissue fragments, or eyeliner pencil dust in your bag? Give it a good cleaning, or at the very least, empty its contents and give it a shake-down outside. You can also use a lint roller or folded piece of tape to extract stubborn debris.
• Use a Charging Port Dust Cover: I suggest buying some charging port dust covers for your phone. You can use these covers every day, but for what it’s worth, I only use them when I go to the beach.
• Try a Magnetic Phone Charger: Magnetic charging cables are pretty neat. Basically, you leave a magnet in your phone’s USB-C port, and when it’s time to charge, you just connect the magnet to a cable. Because your USB-C port is covered by the magnet, it won’t fill with dirt or lint.

Your phone should find itself around a lot less dirt and lint once you learn some of these habits. Of course, you’ll still need to clean your phone’s charging port every once in a while.