Tip: FP2 battery not charging, blinking red led

Help Fairphone 2
1

When you have trouble charging your battery and only see a blinking red light, it means that the battery is below the voltage required for safe charging. The phone will go into a slow charging mode and the battery will start charging normally when the minimum voltage is reached.

In some occasions this process can be stuck in the red led blinking mode. To resolve this you can try the following:

Make sure that your charger is powerfull enough for the FP2, if so:

  • Remove the battery from the phone
  • Connect the charger
  • When the Fairphone screen is visible, immediatly insert the battery.
  • The battery should start charging
  • If the charging led stays off after the battery charge animation closes, remove the battery again (leaving the charger in) and insert it immediatly again. It should now show you the red charging light burning continiously.
  • Leave it like that for at least 10-15 mins before attempting to start the phone.

Note: This behaviour is not specifically Fairphone related. All Li-ion batteries in mobile equipment have this safety built in to prevent batteries from overheating, catching fire or worse, exploding.

If all still fails, contact support.

Hope to be of help to someone :slight_smile:

Alfi

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An extra note on this subject. I read in the news that a lot of inferior USB chargers have been forbidden on the market. Some of these were even a danger to use. Please make sure that you use a charger which is proven to be safe and suitable. A lot of chargers have way too much rimpel on the DC voltage, causing phones to heat up, show unexpected behaviour in screens (Ghost touches etc.) and other unwanted effects.

Also the quality of the USB cable is important. To protect your phone and your battery, stop using these nicely pimped cheap and inferior chargers and cables and make sure you give your FP what it deserves. Get longer battery life, and a longer life of your Fairphone itself.

A list of a Dutch test on chargers can be found here, mind these were all only tested on safety, not on functional quality with regards to the voltage and current they provide.

Hope this helps someone,

Regards,

Alfi

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