Apple investigating iPhone X that exploded after updating to iOS 12.1

Apple is reportedly working with the owner of an iPhone X to figure out why it exploded immediately after being updated to iOS 12.1.

The iPhone was still being updated when it was connected it to Apple's official Lightning cable and wall adapter, Rahel Mohamad told Gadgets360. "Dark gray smoke started coming from the phone. The update was completed and as soon as the phone turned on it started to smoke and caught fire," he noted.

Mohamad contacted Apple Support via Twitter, which has since asked him to ship what's left of the iPhone for analysis.

There have been very few reported incidents of the iPhone X exploding. The cause in this case is most likely a defect in either the battery or the charger, although a software glitch could theoretically have caused the iPhone to exceed its limits. AppleInsider has not seen wide reports of abnormal effects following the iOS 12.1 patch.

All smartphones are potentially at risk of fire due to their use of lithium-ion batteries. Issues like overheating, leakage, or penetration of the battery cell can cause a runaway effect. In the case of Samsung's doomed Galaxy Note 7, a first set of fires was blamed on a design flaw that caused short circuits, while a second was linked to an ultrasonic welding defect that pressed on the battery. The debacle ultimately cost Samsung in excess of $5 billion.

16 Comments

indieshack 336 comments · 9 Years

About 6 years ago

I can't imagine this is anything but an one in a million hardware malfunction. My X heats up bigtime with some apps, also charging but no smoke yet :)

bala1234 167 comments · 6 Years

indieshack said:

I can't imagine this is anything but an one in a million hardware malfunction. My X heats up bigtime with some apps, also charging but no smoke yet :)

Apple sold around 217 Million iPhones in 2017. If 217 iPhones exploded it will be a major disaster for apple even if its 'one in million'.... Just saying when it comes to iPhones careful with your superlatives :wink:

slurpy 5388 comments · 15 Years

bala1234 said:

indieshack said:

I can't imagine this is anything but an one in a million hardware malfunction. My X heats up bigtime with some apps, also charging but no smoke yet :)

Apple sold around 217 Million iPhones in 2017. If 217 iPhones exploded it will be a major disaster for apple even if its 'one in million'.... Just saying when it comes to iPhones careful with your superlatives :wink:

Especially since every single one of those 217 phones will have its own Youtube video and blog articles related to it, and every tech Youtuber will also make their own videos opining about every single one of these cases.

avon b7 8008 comments · 20 Years

I can't see how a system update could cause this. My phone has sensors at every stage, cable included, and it would be unreasonable to think that regular software could override the protection hard wired to the sensors (cut off charging or shutdown). I imagine Apple has the same protections.

Seems to be a freak occurrence but until the remains are analysed we won't know for sure.

wood1208 2931 comments · 10 Years

We are going off tangent relating to if such incident happens in 1 in a million iPhone and outcry. Do we even know this exploded iPhone was due to IOS 12.1 in normal environment or was it updated with 3rd party battery and than updated with 12.1 or was it in water beyond spec says and than connected to charging and updated to 12.1 or ? Bottom line is only reason to pay attention if this incident happened to higher number of normally used Phone. People do all shorts of things to out of warranty iPhones to get free "replacement and publicity and youtube hits".