Galaxy S8 overheats and restarts randomly, stuck on Samsung logo screen
Today’s #GalaxyS8 troubleshooting post talks about scenarios wherein the device experiences some of the common issues in phones today. This article provides you the possible solutions when your S8 becomes erratic, keeps overheating, restarts randomly, or can’t boot to normal mode at all. We hope you’ll find this post helpful.
Problem #1: Galaxy S8 overheats and restarts randomly
My Galaxy S8 is brand new. This is the second time it has happened but it seems worse. My phone keeps overheating & restarting itself. I’ve done all the tricks but it keeps doing it. Stays cool while charging when it’s off but the moment I turn it back on it immediately gets super hot and does it all over again. I literally have no idea what to do and all the repair shops near me work on iPhones only. — Shayleigh
Solution: Hi Shayleigh. It’s very unlikely for a brand new Galaxy S8 to keep on overheating and turning itself off due to a hardware malfunction. If these same exact symptoms also occurred with your previous device, we think that one of the apps you downloaded may be behind this trouble. To check if our hunch is right, you want boot your S8 to safe mode. While running in this mode, no third party apps will be allowed to run. This means that if your S8 works normally, won’t overheat and restart itself randomly, you have yourself a third party app issue.
Third party apps are those that you added after setting up your device the first time. In other words, these are apps that you installed that were not part of the original software package. Even apps from Samsung and Google that were installed later can be considered third party so they should be covered in this troubleshooting step as well.
To boot your S8 to safe mode:
- Turn the device off.
- Press and hold the Power key past the model name screen.
- When “SAMSUNG” appears on the screen, release the Power key.
- Immediately after releasing the Power key, press and hold the Volume down key.
- Continue to hold the Volume down key until the device finishes restarting.
- Safe mode will display in the bottom left corner of the screen.
- Release the Volume down key when you see Safe Mode.
- Check for the issues.
Remember, restarting your device to safe mode won’t identify the problematic app for you. If the problems won’t occur and your phone works normally while on safe mode, you should invest more time in identifying the cause. You can do that by uninstalling an app, restarting back to normal mode, and checking for the issue. If the problem returns, you have to move to the next app.
If nothing changes when on safe mode though, make sure to do a factory reset. This will eliminate the possibility of a software bug. Factory state software is less prone to bugs and we know for a fact that newly setup S8 does not have overheating and random restart issues. So, factory reset is the ultimate software test that you can do. If your S8 continues to overheat and restart on its own after doing a factory reset, that means you have a bad hardware.
To factory reset your S8:
- Back up data on the internal memory. If you have signed into a Google account on the device, you have activated Anti-theft and will need your Google credentials to finish the Master reset.
- Turn off the device.
- Press and hold the Volume Up key and the Bixby key, then press and hold the Power key.
- When the Android logo displays, release all keys (‘Installing system update’ will show for about 30 – 60 seconds before showing the Android system recovery menu options).
- Press the Volume down key several times to highlight “wipe data / factory reset.
- Press Power button to select.
- Press the Volume down key until ‘Yes — delete all user data’ is highlighted.
- Press Power button to select and start the master reset.
- When the master reset is complete, “Reboot system now” is highlighted.
- Press the Power key to restart the device.
Problem #2: Galaxy S8 Plus stuck on Samsung logo screen
Hi, i have a Samsung S8 Plus. it is stuck in the boot up menu. it gets to the Samsung logo and then restarts and does this on loop. i can’t turn it off, it just turns back on and does the same thing again. i have tried to pull up the boot menu, to factory reset it or to start it in safe mode. if i select any of the 4 options i have, it simply restarts and nothing changes. it also has a constant blue light on. it first started when i noticed that my phone was turned off even though i know it had plenty of power, and i never turned it off. i tried to turn it on and then nothing happened but the samsung logo popping up and i think it turned back off agian. i plugged in my phone, the blue light came on and now i can’t turn it off at all. — Nicholas
Solution: Hi Nicholas. The first thing that you need to do right now is to find a way to turn it off. If you can’t power it down, there’s basically nothing much that you can do. So, if pressing the Power button won’t show the Power menu or options, the best thing that you can try first is to force restart it. This troubleshooting step almost always work if an S8 has become unresponsive like the one you have.
To force restart your S8:
- Press and hold the volume down button and don’t release it.
- Then, press and hold the power key while holding down the volume button.
- Keep both keys held down for 10 seconds or more.
Should your S8 remains frozen after attempting a force restart, the next best thing that you can do is to wait until the battery is drained. Then, once the phone turns off, charge it for a few minutes before turning it back on. Hopefully it can go back to its working order after that but if not, consider booting to Recovery Mode again to attempt a factory reset. Otherwise, you have no other option but to contact Samsung so they can take a look at the hardware.
Problem #3: Galaxy S8 won’t boot normally, only loads to Download Mode
Hey guys! I have strange issue with my Galaxy S8. I was using the hotspot from my device while charging it, I saw the green light blink assuming its a message or something unplugged it while trying to wake it up but there was no response. Tried ALL the combinations with the buttons and only “Download Mode” worked. Did a fresh install via Odin (no root, just clean md5) and while doing it the green light didn’t stop blinking, it blinks all the time.The phone tried to boot itself up but it was stuck in a boot loop since I restarted it and strangely the boot screen is BLUE instead black? Any suggestions? What could it be? — Antonio
Solution: Hi Antonio. The first thing that you want to do here is to review the steps you made when flashing the device. Flashing is a risky procedure and making a simple misstep can cause problems and at worst, permanent issue with the software. If you are 100% positive that the flashing guide you followed is accurate and the firmware build you used was correct, then there’s either a bootloader problem or an unknown bug. Frankly, there’s not much that we can do to help in this case because there’s a lot of variables that can come into play. If you got your flashing guide from a particular website, consider contacting the developer or writer of that guide to ask for first hand information about the situation you’re in. If the scenario you’re in is common, there’s a chance that the developer may be aware of a workaround or solution for you.