Smartphones occasionally blow up due to explosive batteries and it seems the Mi A1 has become the latest victim of such an occurrence. It appears the owner of the phone was sleeping near the handset when it burst into flames.
The entire incident was shared by a friend of the owner on Xiaomi’s MIUI forums. The Mi A1 was 8 months old at the time of the incident and hadn’t displayed any heating issues. The user apparently kept the device aside for charging on top of a cardboard box and fell asleep, only to be woken up later that night by a disturbance.
He ignored this and went back to sleep. When he woke up the next morning, he found his Mi A1 completely burnt to a crisp. A piece of cardboard had fused to the back after the rubber cover melted. The only reason he didn’t get hurt was the protective case and the distance between him and the handset.
In a separate post, the owner himself said that he had handed over his Mi A1, official Mi adapter, and third-party charging cable to a Mi Service center for Xiaomi to investigate. The company told him that his phone blew up because he hadn’t used the original cable which came with the device.
Xiaomi Mi A1 Explosion Reasons
However, he argues that the third-party cable is by a reputed brand and hasn’t caused him any problems in the three months he’s been using it for various USB Type-C products. It’s not clear whether Xiaomi will replace his Mi A1 eventually. It might just refuse to do so by shifting the blame to the wire and not the handset itself.
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There haven’t been any other reports about the Mi A1 going up in flames, so it’s possible that this is just an isolated incident. Smartphone users should ideally avoid charging their devices at night and keep it as far away as possible if they must.