Can water damaged phones be fixed with a simple YouTube video?

It happens to the best of us, whether we drop it in a puddle, use it in the rain or knock it over a glass of water – but what if there was an easy fix at home that’s easier said than done in a bag of rice?

A YouTube video, which has amassed 45 million views, promises to do just that through sound vibrations, which will, in theory, “blow the water out of your phone’s speaker and completely remove the water from your mobile speakers.” .

Hundreds of thousands of viewers are singing its praises in the comments, swearing the two-minute video fixed their phones after spills, drops and other liquid mishaps.

But skeptical tech experts wanted to test the so-called cure for waterproof devices, new editions of which lose their water resistance over time.

According to The Verge, the speakers work by pushing air around, meaning the force can push water out of a phone’s speakers.

“The lowest tone that speaker can reproduce, the highest it can play,” Eric Freeman, a senior director of research at Bose, told the paper. “This will create more air movement, which will push the water that is trapped inside the phone.”

The caveat, however, is that smartphone speakers are small — unlike larger speakers that can produce low and loud sound — and YouTube videos can’t deliver “really deep bass.”

But in theory, the sounds from the YouTube video should act like the Apple Watch’s water ejection feature.

“It’s just a specific oscillating tone that pushes the water out of the speaker grilles,” Carsten Frauenheim, a repair engineer at iFixit, told The Verge. “I’m not sure how effective the 3rd party versions are for phones, as maybe they aren’t ideally tuned? We could test.”

Working with the team at iFixit, The Verge writer David Pierce picked four phones he was “willing to destroy in the name of science”—the Nokia 7.1, iPhone 13, Pixel 7 Pro, and Pixel 3—and put them in a UV bath. The next day, the team checked to make sure the water had entered the phone and not out.

While the Pixel 7 Pro was dry, the Nokia was “destroyed”, while the iPhone 13 and Pixel 3 retained some juice.

When the YouTube video was played on the phone, a detailed video of the device’s speakers showed water droplets pouring out. However, it wasn’t a fix for other parts of water phones, like the USB port or the SIM card slot.

“I say [the videos] kind of work,” engineering student Chayton Ritter, who works with iFixit’s editorial team, told The Verge. “It can’t hurt, but I don’t see it being a complete fix and a way to get all the juice out.”