You spend all day with your phone, setting it down on tables, chairs, public benches, bathroom counters, and even more unsightly places. And you can't always see the germs, dirt, grime, and potentially even viruses your phone is allowing to call home. Following the COVID-19 pandemic, we've realized that keeping our phones clean and sanitized is of greater importance than ever before.
Thankfully, you can clean and disinfect your Android phone using the best disinfectant wipes and sprays. You should never use Clorox or Lysol wipes to eliminate germs or viruses on your phone's screen. Getting your devices clean again can be easy if you know what to use. The following guide will show you everything you need to know to clean and disinfect your Android phone properly. The FCC recommends not spraying cleaner directly onto the device and cleaning your phone once a day.
We have listed the products we used in this guide below and at the bottom of the guide as well. You don't need to get the same brands, but these examples should help you know what to buy before deep cleaning your phone.
Products used in this guide:
- For all the nooks and crannies: DanziX 35-Piece Phone Cleaning Kit ($10 at Amazon)
- Safe on screens: Zeiss Mobile Screen Wipes (From $16 at Amazon)
- Overboard but efficient: Homedics UV-Clean Phone Sanitizer ($15 at Amazon)
What NOT to use when cleaning your phone
Lysol or Clorox wipes might seem like an easy way to clean grime off a phone and the perfect way to fend off viruses. But fight this instinct with every phone-loving fiber of your being. Bleach, vinegar, alcohol, and most harsh disinfectant chemicals can clean the sides and back of an Android phone or iPhone.
Still, those chemicals must stay far away from the glass front of your phone (and glass back if you have one). They will eat away at the oleophobic coating that your phone uses to help fight fingerprint smudges. The parts of your phone that can be treated must be humid for four minutes to disinfect it properly. If your phone's manufacturer says it's OK to clean your device with Lysol or Clorox wipes, ensure you turn it off and unplug it before cleaning it.
What if your phone's oleophobic coating is already gone? Or do you just not care about it? The oleophobic coating wears down naturally over time, so if yours is already gone, feel free to go to town with some Lysol wipes. Just be careful as you do. Make sure you don't let the liquid from the wipe seep into any ports or pinhole mics, and let the solution dry completely from the phone before you re-apply your case.
These chemicals don't play nice with your phone's interior components, and if they seep in far enough to trip the water damage sensor most phones have these days, you might not be covered for a warranty replacement if something shorts out.
Compressed air can be useful since it blows dust out of hard-to-reach places. However, you need to be very, very careful when using it with a phone, as its precise, pressurized air blasts can damage pinhole mics and other components quite easily.
How to clean your phone by hand
Note: If your case is made of leather or other luxury materials, try looking for cleaners specific to your material. The maker of your case will likely have cleaning guidelines on their website or in the box the case came in.
1. Use cloth and polyurethane foam-tipped swabs in the Phone Cleaning Kit (or Q-Tips, if you've got the time to whittle the tips to points) to gently swab around the earpiece, speaker grills, and various ports on your phone.
2. Be extra careful when swabbing the USB-C/Lightning port to avoid leaving fibers behind or dislodging pieces inside the port. If one of the larger swabs doesn't fit in your USB-C/Lightning port, use one of the mini brushes included in the Phone Cleaning Kit instead (or a small, soft toothbrush).
3. Take a Zeiss Mobile Screen Wipe and wipe down the screen and body of the phone. While the Zeiss Wipe doesn't have harsh chemicals, its evaporative pre-moistened solution should still be enough to remove the top layer of grime and germs from your phone.
4. If any streaks remain after using the Zeiss wipes, use a microfiber cloth (or a clean, non-embroidered kitchen towel) to wipe the screen clear.
5. Once the phone and case are both completely dry, re-apply your case to your phone.
If you don't regularly use your headphone port (if the phone even has one) — or tend to acquire more dirt and lint in your ports than usual — consider investing in dust plugs to help keep your port clear and clean when not charging. If you'd like to cut down on grime accumulated on your screen/case when you use your phone, put your phone down for a few minutes and wash your grimy hands or apply some hand sanitizer before returning to browsing Reddit.
Or try not to use the phone at all while running errands. Use wireless earbuds if you need to answer a call, and check messages by glancing at a smartwatch instead, for example. When you get home, don't take it out of your pocket or purse until you've had the chance to wash your hands thoroughly.
Seriously, clean your hands, ya filthy animal!
The easiest way to disinfect your phone
There are solutions you can make by diluting isopropyl alcohol that can clean and disinfect your Android phone. Again, you generally want to avoid alcohol and vinegar as they'll eat through the oleophobic coating. If not that, what's a girl to disinfect with instead? UV! Ultraviolet lights can kill bacteria and disinfect your phone in just a few minutes inside a doll-sized tanning bed.
There are a few versions of these UV phone baths out there. The HoMedics UV-Clean Phone Sanitizer is a neat option worth considering. It uses UV-C LED sanitizing and patented pop-up technology to sanitize both sides of your phone in about a minute (30 seconds per side), and it doesn't use mercury or chemicals. Designed to kill 99.9% of bacteria on your phone, it even collapses flat and fits in a case so you can bring it with you. The rechargeable LEDs last for thousands of uses.
If you have a super-sized phone like the Galaxy S24 Ultra, you'll want to opt for one like the Phonesoap Pro UV Smartphone Sanitizer to ensure your phone fits. It is guaranteed to fit the largest phone sizes and thickest cases, including those from brands like Otterbox.
I like to bathe my phone and case separately so that no grime can hide under the case's cracks and crevices, but you can stick your phone in the case and kill all of the surface bacteria on it. Consider investing in one of these sanitizing devices and running your phone through it at least once a week or whenever you head out to run errands.
Cleaning kit essentials
When it comes to cleaning options for your Android phone, you have different options to choose from. But the options below are our recommendations and will hopefully be the ones you use from now on. But you may also have products like these sitting around your house already.
Brushes galore
Get into your phone's nooks and crannies with these assorted brushes. This set includes 35 different-sized tips, so you can reach into all of the hard-to-reach places to remove and absorb dirt, sand, and debris.
Wipe those germs off
Zeiss makes these excellent Mobile Screen Wipes that are safe to use on screens. It's the best way to disinfect a smart device with a touch screen without destroying it inadvertently.
Sanitizing chamber
This might seem like you're going overboard, but a UV-Clean Phone Sanitizer is an efficient way to get the job done. This tanning bed uses UV lights to kill surface bacteria on your phone and help eliminate germs, so you don't get sick.
