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A 1¢ toothpick works 99% of the time.
For the missing 1% use isopropanol.
10 USD??? I justo walk into a phone repair shop and ask them if they can clean it. they do it in under a minute for free
Walk into a store? I just use a toothpick or a needle
My toothpicks are not that thin.
I usually pass various phone shops on my way to buy groceries, so it's not an inconvenience
I use a plastic one - the ones that have a floss "D" on one end and a pick on the other. They're very thin and can also be bent to form a bit of a hook.
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That is not how Verizon stores work in the US. They dont even fuckin carry Samsung OEM charging blocks at my local Verizon wireless store. They havent done anything tech support related in a very long time. You basically go there for them to use your phone to call their customer/technical support to ultimately tell you to take it to a You Break IT We Fix IT store.
People don't try cleaning their charging port before buying a new device? Thats crazy. I really have a hard time believing people don't try cleaning before buying a new device.
I mean, it's one phone, paper_moon. What could it cost? $1000?
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I've been using magnetic USB cables and adapters on my devices for years. I occasionally need to clean their connection, but otherwise they work well. Found one I liked and purchased a bunch of them. Now the car, house, office, etc. all have one of the magnetic cables nearby.
They charge a little slower, but that's better for my battery long-term anyway.
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My charging port died and I'm so pissed. 2 year old Google pixel. Never buying pixel again. I looked up how to desolder the charging port and it's a pain in the ass. It has this like weird shield over it and I have no idea how to desolder this thing. Why can't it be straight forward
Yeah... be incredibly careful about shoving something with metal bristles into your charging port.
Maybe once a year I get a bit of gunk in my port (hey-oh!). Samsung (presumably all usb c androids?) are generally really good about losing their shit and yelling at you to remove the cable immediately and clean your port.
So when I get home? I just get one of my flossers (for teeth) that tend to have a cheap plastic toothpick attached to it. Works perfect, no liquids, and very minimal risk of damaging the port.
I’m not saying anyone should follow my example, and in fact I’m probably saying no one should follow my example… but I have definitely used a metal glasses screwdriver to clean my charging port before
I’ve always used wooden toothpicks because
- Common
- Made from cheap soft wood: more likely to deform or destruct against metal than most plastics
- Cut with the grain: especially soft to anything raking against the sides (like delicate pins)
- The uneven “splintery” sides happen to be pretty good at snagging tiny fibers of lint to pull them out as one big ball, requiring fewer swipes
More techniques:
- clean with port facing straight down to get gravity assist
- blow across the opening of the port: mild negative pressure + agitation inside cavity vs blowing directly into port (which is generally warned against explicitly)
- focus on “pinning” lint up against each of the two corners and holding gentle pressure during extraction: these corners of the port have no exposed pins, and happen to be where lint tends to accumulate anyway
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I use a toothpick.
Literally just use one of those toothpick flosser things. The end is usually a plastic pick, which is perfect.
I used to shock and amaze people when I'd pull out half a cottonballs worth of pocket lint and get their phones working again.
And don't waste $10 on a kit. A toothpick and canned air does everything you need.
As I told another person with similar reply, the purchase was for the adhesive plugs to prevent this from happening in the future as i prepped to buy a new phine but the plugs happened to come with a jankey cleaning kit and turned my frown upside down. The plugs are as much of the take away as the cleaning the port.
Wireless chargers as your bedside charger will also reduce wear on your charge port so if thats the weak point of your phone that will help it last longer
Do the same with your butthole. Thank me later
What the fuck are you people doing that causes the phone to not charge anymore? Rolling around in the mud naked with the phone clamped between your ass cheeks? Edit: this is sarcasim and is not meant to be taken literally.
I have never had an issue with charging my phone(s) at any point in the last 20+ years. That includes both android and iphones. I even have my phone upside down in my pocket so the charging port is facing up.
You must appease the Machine Spirit. You have to chant the prayers to the Omnissiah, burn the holy incense, and rub the phone in purified oils.
The Machine Spirit must be appeased.
I always use wireless charging, and have a silicone plug in my phone's USB port to stop dirt getting in there. Very similar to these: https://a.co/d/aFWuSI3 (just standalone plugs with no adhesive). I see some in the photo with adhesive to stick them to the phone, but that seems like it'd look ugly.
In the rare case that I need to plug something into it, the port is completely clean.
I gave mine a good blow out like a Nintendo cartridge
I was scaping compacted sawdust off the bottom of the port with force using the Mcguyver'ed zip tie tool lol
I recently got a replacement battery and also the usb c circuitry. Got it replaced for $15 (everything included). Phone is effectively new now.
Can you share any instructional material you used to learn how to change the battery and charging port?
Never mind those, where do I get those cool rear view mirrors for my phone?
Huh? Lol I dont get it. What you calling rear view mirrors for a phone? or are you joking about wishing you had hindsight? 😂
No need to waste money on a "kit" for such a basic task.
The plugs homie. I bought the plugs. They came with the jankey cleaning kit that changed my life hahah
As an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure I recommend those tiny rubber stoppers you see in the photo. They have a peel and stick part that goes under your case which retains the plug on a strip of rubber. That strip might wear out in a few years and rip, but they cost almost nothing to replace (and in fact come in packs).
Phones used to have these things built in, then they stopped in the smartphone era because they didn't look as sleek and futuristic I guess. Now, if you have a case, it once again makes hardly any difference to the appearance.
I see seven things in that photo. Please explain what each one is and what they do.
You can regularly blast the port with compressed air to minimise the build up of crud which necessitates this, but the time comes to all.
~~I mean I cant speak for the fancy new oil-less compressors but dont you lubricate your compressor and run oil thru the lines to protect your tools and prevent broken airlines?~~
~~Plus the chance of forgetting to lower the psi before spraying the port cuz I've never done that ever before 🤣 idk man, id prolly test it first on an old broken screen phones before I started blasting phone holes lol.~~
Ohhhhhhh shit your talking about the aerosol cans of compressed air hahahaha fuck im an idiot lol
My phone is a Galaxy Z-Fold5, not new but not old enough for me to replace since the Fold7 just shipped.
Was hell bent sure the issue causing my phone to begin not accepting charging cables* was something Samsung was doing with their software updates. (*It charged fine with contactless chargers if youre ok with it taking 10-14 hours to charge)
It was too much of a coincidence that the phone charged 100% fine with any and all cables. Download a software update (not android update, this was samsung delivered update) phone doesnt charge with a cable after that for 2-3 weeks. Im T1Diabetic who uses wifi connected glucose monitor, so it fuckin drains battery juice 24/7 with very little setting controls to mitigate it. So I spent 2-3 weeks battling with it to charge on charging pads.
Didn't change a thing with what I was doing and BAM another Samsung update, weirdly close to the last update and fuck me running if the phone didnt start charging very very tenderly with charging cables again.
Eventually figured fuck it, if its hard to do the phone is broke if its easy enough to do then maybe it will help and bought a pack of adhesive rubber type C port plugs from Amazon that came with a super cheap cleaning kit. It wasnt anything special. It came with the picture pointed and spaded q-tips, a flexible wire brush, then I used my own zip tie that I shaped, a sim card tool and a cloth for cleaning glasses. AND WENT TO FUCKING TOWN.
Everytime you plug in your charger to your phone, any dust that is in there is getting buttfucked into the back of the phone's charging port like its a muzzleloaded gunpowder. Lol a bit hyperbplic but you get the point.
Finished cleaning the port. Plugged it in. First fuckin try, no fighting it, no switching chargers, no "charging but not fast charging" bullshit, no more voids in guessing my blood sugar, no more watching tv holding charger into phone. AND $1,000+ THAT IS STILL IN MY FUCKING ACCOUNT.
I gotta assume this is the #1 driver for phones needing to be replaced ever since the screens stopped shattering everytime you sneezed. The adhesive rubber plug is amazing. It is hardly noticeable and stays in the charging port even with my opening and closing of screens. It never pops out.
Honestly the smartest $10 I think I may have ever spent.
TLDR: Phone not charging? Buy $10 type C cleaning kit from amazon, watch 5min video on tips for cleaning, clean charging port for night and day results. Not difficult, very hard to fuck up your phone unless you jackhammer the port cleaning it. Saves you the cost of a new phone.
And obviously this isnt a fix all for all charging issues.
Get a magnetic charge cord. There’ll be a tiny dongle that you plug in once, then the complementary cable has a magnet end that snaps to.
They’re cheap and easy, though not all of them are interchangeable with each other, so figure out how many device you want to use and in how many places, and buy everything at once.
Hollllllly fuck why is this the first time im hearing about this. It makes soooo much sense.
This is the ebay listing for some I bought, that I like the best. These are popwer only, no data, just two contacts. The magnetic part is circular, so it'll rotate, and the 90 degree hinge in the cable is loose so it won't bind up. When I bought these, you could buy all sorts of cable lengths and all sorts of dongle ends in pretty much any quantities you want. I'd bet you can find this at the same seller's store or elsewhere.
If we had Atari cartridges in 2025 kids would be buying kits to clean them and blow into them.
The specs of saliva that go along with blowing corrode the contacts over time, so it is actually better to find an alternative with a soft brush and non/less-acidic cleaning solution.
Nintendo sold cartridge cleaning kits in the 90s (maybe even the 80s).
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this post was submitted on 03 Nov 2025
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