What's up with Samsung phones catching on fire?

Evidently Apple prefers to disappoint users with uninspired, yet tried and tested "new" phones like the iPhone 13, rather than rush to release something hugely ambitious that may have issues and hurt the brand image. But Samsung?

A Z Fold 3 reportedly caught on fire recently

Recently we reported on a Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 3 5G exploding, after being dropped by its owner a week before that. The owner says that Samsung will replace the phone, and that the phone clearly suffered some integrity damage following the drop.

I've personally dropped many phones in my life, made by both trusted big-name brands like Apple and less reputable (but still huge) manufacturers like Xiaomi, and never did a phone catch on fire.

The 2017 Xiaomi Mi Max 2, which is one of the phones I'm referring to and probably the most abused one in my family, is a massive phablet with a huge 5300mAh battery, yet it's still working flawlessly to this day (I gave it to my dad). No fires, barely any bumps and scratches even.

Why the cutting-edge Galaxy Z Fold 3 reacted this way after being dropped is up for speculation. Indeed, it's a unique smartphone that required some clever engineering for it to be reasonably thin, with a display that's reasonably sturdy, yet foldable. The question is, did the same careful engineering go into the Z Fold 3's 4400 mAh battery?

Safety should be first, and there's nothing more dangerous on a phone than the lithium-ion battery inside. And Samsung should know by now how important securing a phone's battery is...

A Galaxy A21 combusted on an airplane this August

Two months ago a Samsung Galaxy A21 caught on fire in an airplane, causing mass evacuation. The phone reportedly combusted spontaneously, assumedly due to a defective battery malfunction.

The event transpired in Seattle, thankfully with only short-lasting consequences. A spokesperson for the Port of Seattle had this to say following the accident:



Unlike the Z Fold 3, the Galaxy A21 isn't an expensive flagship but a budget phone, not exactly cutting-edge or featuring any extreme design oddities that could at least in part excuse what transpired on that plane. It appears that its battery was just defective.

We can't forget the 2016 Galaxy Note 7 and Galaxy S7

Back in 2016, Samsung discontinued its Galaxy Note 7 flagship just two months after its release, due to battery defects causing the phone to overheat, combust or explode. Around that time, a Galaxy S7 Edge also reportedly caught on fire.

But we'll focus on the Note 7, as it's definitely the model that became Samsung's biggest PR nightmare to date. The phone's battery reportedly had a design flaw that made it susceptible to bending, and indeed, there was no shortage of reports of Note 7s catching on fire.

The Note 7 was swiftly swept under the rug and we tend to try and forget about it as a single Samsung error from years ago, but there are reports now that the upcoming Galaxy S22 may be packing a battery made by the same Note 7 battery supplier. This may be of concern to users, if true.

Why does this happen to Samsung and not Google or Apple?

Well, although not as often, Apple also makes the news for all the wrong reasons from time to time. In 2012 we reported on an alleged self-combusting iPhone, plus there are other cases like an iPhone 4 exploding on an airplane or the iPhone charger that caught on fire just months ago, badly injuring a girl.

But – huge asterisks – the latter two were not the fault of Apple, but were caused by a third-party iPhone repair job and a third-party charging adapter respectively. So we can't exactly blame the Cupertino company with the fruit logo for those two.

As for the other major player – Google – a Reddit user reported that their Pixel 3 XL caught on fire while charging, about three years ago, and had a photo to prove it. However, again, it's hard for us to blame Google on a now-deleted Reddit post, as the accident could've similarly been due to a third-party charger.

It's worth noting that over the recent years there have been threads from various Pixel users online claiming their phones have gotten very hot and eventually caught on fire. But whether all of those reports are legitimate is up for debate, as proof to support the claims is often sparse.

Back to Samsung. The Korean giant is one of the world's leading smartphone manufacturers. It sells a huge amount of phones per year, and the more products you ship, the more likely it is that at least a few of them will be defective.

To be fair, Apple and Xiaomi, among others, also ship a whole lot of phones, yet their users don't seem to be calling the fire department as often. And we all know that if Apple does produce a defective iPhone, it won't slip past anyone's radar.

Should you be carrying a Galaxy phone in one pocket and a fire extinguisher in another?

Well, you do need some big pockets for the Galaxy Z Fold 3 anyway, so might as well…

Just kidding, by all means don't let any of this deter you from buying a smartphone, just be careful how you charge your phone and consider reaching out to a certified repair service after dropping it, whatever your phone's brand may be.

Third-party chargers in particular are usually something to avoid, unless they're from reputable brands like Anker, Belkin, Aukey, Spigen, etc. For the Z Fold 3 in particular we have a "best Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 3 chargers" list you may find helpful.

In any case, by all means buy the Galaxy Z Fold 3 if you like it, because the money you spend on it will further encourage Samsung to continue innovating and improving the Z Fold line. And hopefully, Samsung will also start putting greater focus on securing its smartphone batteries, as despite what you may be thinking after reading this, I love the brand, and would like to not see its reputation take a hit yet again with the upcoming S22.