It’s summer! How to protect your smartphones from overheating

Technology is expensive and there are countless ways to ruin yours.

While we’re talking money, I’ve put together a list of tech freebies you can grab right now.

Now for bad news: your smartphone hates heat.

Smartphones work best between 35 and 95 degrees.

Colder or hotter, you may damage hardware and shorten battery life.

So what can you do when there is record heat?

Steps to protect your phone

You can keep your phone happy no matter the weather with just a few simple steps.

Stay in the shade.

Be careful not to expose your phone to the sun.

Aim for the shadow if you’re outdoors or even in the car.

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Do not put it on the sunny pa*senger seat.

It’s a one-way ticket to overheating.

Take off your phone case.

They trap heat, which can be more or less problematic depending on the material they are made from.

Just be very careful not to drop it and break your screen.

I keep one of these screen protectors for this reason.

Stuck outside or in a hot room?

You want to make your phone as light as possible, process-wise.

Disable Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and demanding apps.

Graphics-heavy games, video streaming, and other resource-intensive tasks can strain your phone’s hardware and cause it to overheat.

Your computer is also in danger

It can happen any time of the year, but the hotter it gets, the more likely your laptop or even your desktop computer is to overheat.

And like your phone, too high temperatures can seriously damage internal components.

Try these steps.

Break the dust: You will need a small set of screwdrivers, a can of compressed air (or an electric duster that never runs out) and some cotton swabs.

• Turn off your computer, unplug it, and open the case.
• Gently use compressed air or a feather duster to clean the fan, vents and ducts.
• Gently wipe away any buildup using cotton swabs. Just make sure you don’t leave any small cotton threads behind.
• Put the box back in place and plug everything back in.

Improve your laptop’s airflow.

Your computer can overheat if it can’t circulate enough air to stay cool.

Make sure it is resting on a hard surface like a desk.

If you lay your laptop on a bed or blanket, the uneven surface blocks the vents and can cause overheating.

Place it on a book, tray or cooling pad to maintain air circulation.

Close everything you can. Yes, too many processes can also create too much heat in your PC or laptop.

Dozens of tabs might heat things up more than you think.

Restart your computer while you’re at it to shut down processes running in the background.

Real talk: A power outage during a heat wave can be deadly.

I have written about the steps to take now to keep you safe.