Chosen Solution
The button on my Motorola Droid RAZR suddenly stopped working. When I press it, it doesn’t turn the screen on or off and it won’t pop up with the power off option for my phone. If I let my screen turn off or go into “sleep,” I can’t get my screen to come on unless I plug it into a charger, but the button is useless. Can it be fixed?
My wife just had the same thing happen to her RAZR. She took it to the VerizonWireless store. They told her they don’t repair phones and, since our phones aren’t insured, they started talking to her about payment plans for a new phone (at full price). Long story short… I told her to come home and I’ll check all our options. That’s when I found your question here. I downloaded Smart Screen On, but it didn’t really work for me. I found out it was created for the Samsung Galaxy and not guaranteed to work on other devices. I figured I’d reboot the phone in case the proximity sensor wasn’t engaged. Well, what do you know? Rebooting fixed the power button! Here’s how: Hold the power button down while pressing the down (-) volume button on the phone. Hold that until the Motorola logo appears and the boot up sequence starts.
IMPORTANT: note that sometimes the battery will be completely dead and the use of the volume down plus the power button won’t perform the soft reset. The battery can go dead suddenly for various reasons which I won’t discuss here since I don’t know much about that. To revive your phone: Plug the phone into your charger overnight. THEN first hold down the volume down button, and then also hold down the power button and keep both pressed. It can take as long as a minute or more for the reset to be performed. The reset is intended to do the same thing as removing and replacing the battery on phones with removable batteries. If the phone doesn’t then come alive stop pressing the buttons and give it a little time. If it still does not come alive it is possible your internal battery failed completely and must be replaced. But you can try the charge and reset a few more times, hold down the buttons shorter or longer, etc. If those don’t work get on the forums again and search for more answers before you go to the trouble of replacing the battery.
I had the same problem. I am close to my upgrade date and don’t want to spend the money to fix it. I found an app in the google play store called smart screen on, it works to get your screen to turn on. The one thing that I found was that I tried to wave my hand to fast. It requires a simple paced wave or tap on you screen sensor.
This doesn’t work for me at all… I understand the concept and I realize this is the first droid with a built in battery that can be reset. But my power lock button is NOT WORKING, so when I go to reset IT DOESN’T WORK because it required the power button… Holding power & volume up, power & volume down, and power with both volume buttons does nothing. I’ve done all three multiple times for the past 3 hours. Makes sense to reset the phone to make a button work WITH the button that doesn’t work??? I’m glad everyone else fixed the issue but it’s not working here.
I had the same problem and found this site. However, after a couple of hours it crossed my mind that it possibly had something to do with the charger or battery. I notice a couple of days before that although plugged in it was not charging up at all. At that tiem I unplugged it from the wall socket and placed it somewhere else and it worked. This did not happen tonight I decided to remove the USB part of the charger from the plug and inserted the USB into my computer. The mobile phone started to charge. I hope this is all it is for others. After the phone has nearly charged I will try putting the USB back into the plug and make sure it is fully fitted in and place it in the wall socket. If it does not work, maybe it will be the fuse in the plug.
I had the exact same issue and I held down the power and volume down buttons and it worked like a charm. Its all fixed!! Great advice!
Ah! Thank you so much! I too was having problems with my power button to where it wouldn’t work and I had to plug my charger in to even get into my phone. I couldn’t figure out how to restart it since the power button is obviously how I shut it off/turn it on and I did exactly what you said to do and voila…IT WORKS NOW! Saved me a trip to the Verizon store especially because I know they would’ve just told me I had to buy another one since my contract isn’t up. & because my dad accidently deleted my insurance off when he was updating the minutes on our phones since we never came close to them. You think it would be covered through verizon and they would replace the phone since it would be a mal function that isn’t due to me causing the issue. Yeah right. They just want you’re moneyyyy! thanks again though! Glad I’m not the only one experiencing this so that I knew how to resolve it…for now at least! Lol
Thank you thank you thank you thank you!!! I had no idea what I was going to do and had not a clue why it happened. Brilliant, you are.
how do you download the smart screen if your phone is already frozen? I am pretty sure my power button is broke
Kevin, does your screen wake up when you plug in your charger? If so that is when you can reboot per the instructions above.
I got the phone to reboot doing this, but the power button still does not work.
i actually used the Smart screen on and it worked as i already tried to rebooting but fortunately it didn’t work so i recommended it
Im trying to to turn my phone on! Help!! when its plugged into the charger, i can turn on the screen to see how much it is charging by using the “power button” and the “down button” but it wont reset itself or turn on. its almost completely charged but i cant get it to turn on! HELPPP
did the reset holding the power and -vol button down for about 20 sec. waiting for the logo. when I let go the logo popped up and the phone reset. Power button working now.
Oh my. I have had a broken power button and been searching for a month on how to fix and FINALLY Came across this. You have saved me so much money and the rest of my time. thank u so much!
I had this problem several months ago and this solved the problem. It happened again today, but now it will not respond. The only thing that happens is the volume is turned down. :( I guess this only works once. Update Update: I plugged in my phone to a computer via the USB cable. (I also have the settings set to lock my screen only to open with a 4-digit password). When I plugged the phone into my computer, my screen came up. I put the phone on silent. Only then was I able to press the power button then the volume down button and hold them both until the phone reset. The button works now.
I have the same problem with my RAZR Maxx. I downloaded the Smart Screen (Lite) from the play store. Although it says it is for the Galaxy Nexus, it works fine on the RAZR. Once I got the phone on again which took about 10 minutes, I started the app and it works to wake a sleeping RAZR. I’ve used it the last 24 hrs, no problem. I also set the sleep time to the max 10 minutes so it doesn’t go to sleep as often, just to be safe.
thanks for your help jimhert. with the program “Smart Screen (Lite)” my cell is working , but I’ll have to keep it charged, if I missed I’m quite certain that it will stay off for till I’ll have it fixed.
Hello, i had almost the same problem with you and i came across this answer… The start button has been destroyed and when i say destroyed, i mean we can’t press it anymore/ o i am talking about a useless button anymore… Is there any way to make android phone start even only once, so that after that, do whatever solutions (e.g. software restart or software reset or locking) you proposing here?? Can the button be always pressed, i think this could be a solution, or it will keep locking the phone after that? thank you.
Thank you. My Droid Maxx HD just had similar issues and I did exactly as explained here (power button + volume (-)). Amazingly, the moto logo appeared. Thanks I owe you a beer.
i had charged my phone all night and it still would not turn on. I plugged it into my computer and the computer recognized it but the screen still would not turn on… I held the - and the power buttons until i heard the disconnect tone on the computer and yee haw the phone came on!!! Thanks
Thanks! Works! I cannot wait to go back to the Verizon store I stopped at on the way home last night. They will get a piece of my mind.. Tried to sell me insurance or a new phone. Tech said they could not do anything.
Hi! For 2 1/2 yrs, my Motorola Razr V has been great, but today, it inexplicably “turned off” & the on/off switch instantly became useless! I thought “Battery?” until the phone rang, lit up & showed a FULL charge! After the call, the (again dark) screen only lit up by plugging in the charger. “Reboot” to fix this? How - with a dead on/off switch??? “Malware”?? Maybe!! So I searched – & found YOUR article instead. Your “REBOOT” METHOD – WORKED!! – & IT FIXED THE PROBLEM!! – THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!
Worked great for me and saved an expensive repair. I had to hold the power and + volume to get it to recycle but I returned to full function. I had the same problem with the phone only turning on with an incoming call or attached to power.
I’ve had 4 xt885 Droid Razr phones that have suffered a faulty power switch. The Droid Razrs come with 2 spare switches in the volume control. If you are handy with a soldering iron the switches can be swapped. Be sure to undo the battery terminals before the screwed down cover plate is removed.
In general the hard user reboot is suggested about once a month, followed by an extended recharge cycle. It forces clean-up of memory leaks caused by faulty Android app software, which is something that “safe mode” cannot do by itself.
