Whenever I get a call from co-worker Chad I know it's one of two things.  Either something needs to be done, or he has an idea for something. Today it was 'idea time' for Chad.

Chad mentioned that he had just been talking to his sister and they were wondering if their iPhones were going to have a 'POLAR VORTEX' episode during our cold snap that's coming up. I asked what he was talking about and he said;

I was out shoveling snow the other day, and I reached in my pocket to make a call and my iPhone had totally shut down. It was charged, it just shut off. Period. Then I talked to my sister and she said that her phone was doing the same thing.

So naturally I asked, What kind of phone do you have. He said, 'I was just going to say that:  iPhone.

Now, this isn't a which hunt on the iPhone. If they carry a smart phone, half the world carry the iPhone. But it does seem that iPhones, like most people aren't a fan of the extreme cold weather.  We asked the question on our Facebook page:

If you have a smartphone, does it behave differently in extreme cold weather. I-Phone, Android? What do you have and have you noticed?

 

So, I did a little more research. I discovered that Huffington Post had posted an article on iPhones and their dislike for cold weather.

On its website, Apple suggests that you only use your (4th generation or later) iPhone in environments between 32º and 95º F, since “low- or high-temperature conditions might temporarily shorten battery life or cause the device to alter its behavior to regulate its temperature.”

 

If the temperature drops below 32º, your best bet is keeping your phone turned off and stored somewhere warmer, Apple suggests. It’ll probably still work though — so you can take your chances. But when the temperature gets crazy low, falling below -4º, Apple says to put it away. (You should also store it when the mercury tops 113º F.)

 

Toronto’s Global News recently ran an experiment to see how iPhones reacted to the cold. They took two iPhones of the same model and left one outside in the cold (where temps barely edged above zero Fahrenheit ) and took the other one inside. Thirty minutes later, the iPhone that was inside had gone from 100 percent battery life to 99 percent, while the one left in the cold had dropped to 86 percent from 100. When they tried to use the cold iPhone it shut off.

Hey, this doesn’t mean that Android phones are better than the popular iPhone. It does mean though that they in fact do react to cold weather differently.
If you do a lot of outdoor activities in cold environments you might want to consider that. If you’re an ice fisherman or work in construction in cold weather it might be something to consider.

Personally, I use a Samsung Galaxy S4 that I use courtesy of Sprint/Sioux Falls and the weather doesn’t seem to bother it. From the looks of our unscientific survey taken on our Facebook page, most Android users would agree.

More From KYBB-FM / B102.7