How-tos

How to fix Black Screen of Death on Galaxy S10 [troubleshooting guide]


Black Screen of Death or simply known as black screen issue is one of the most common troubles of a lot of smartphone users. In today’s troubleshooting post, we show you how to deal with this problem on Galaxy S10.

Before we proceed, we want to remind you that if you are looking for solutions to your own #Android issue, you can contact us by using the link provided at the bottom of this page. When describing your issue, please be as detailed as possible so we can easily pinpoint a relevant solution. If you can, kindly include the exact error messages you are getting to give us an idea where to start. If you have already tried some troubleshooting steps before emailing us, make sure to mention them so we can skip them in our answers.

How to fix Black Screen of Death on Galaxy S10

There are a number of possible reasons why a Galaxy S screen turns black and remain that way. The most common cause though is physical malfunction following an accidental drop or liquid exposure. If none of these things happen on your own S10, it’s possible that the problem may have a software background. Learn how to fix it by following our suggestions below.

Confirm device is turning on. Many users confuse black screen issue with No Power issue. The former means that the device’s screen has gone dark but otherwise phone is still functional and  continue to boot up. The latter is indicated by total loss of signs that the device is turning on. No Power is indicated by the absence of other indicators like the capability to vibrate, make sound notifications, or show LED lights. If you are positive that your phone has a black screen issue, then go ahead with the rest of the troubleshooting steps below. If you think you have a No Power problem, visit this page for solutions.

Forced reboot. On many instances with other Galaxy S devices, black screen issue is due to an unresponsive system only. This means that the device has frozen after encountering a bug that it was unable to resolve by itself. In most cases though, the problem can be fixed by simply rebooting the phone. If you are unable to restart your S10 using the usual method of pressing the Power key, consider a forced reboot. Here’s how:

  1. Press and hold the Power + Volume Down buttons for approximately 10 seconds or until the device power cycles. Allow several seconds for the Maintenance Boot Mode screen to appear.
  2. From the Maintenance Boot Mode screen, select Normal Boot. You can use the volume buttons to cycle through the available options and the lower left button (below the volume buttons) to select. Wait for up to 90 seconds for the reset to complete.

Allow battery to drain to restart. If you are unable to reboot the device at all, you may need to allow the battery to become empty. It’s usually not recommended to let your phone drain the battery fully but your case can be an exemption. Just make sure not to leave it uncharged for long to prevent the battery from fully depleting its reserve energy. When your device shows that its battery is at 0%, that’s really not the case. Its battery is designed to retain tiny amount of power to keep its circuits alive until the next charge. However, if you don’t charge the battery soon and this small amount of power in the battery gets fully depleted, it can kill the battery for good. What you want to do in this case is to charge the phone within hour after it shuts down by itself.

Boot to Safe Mode. If the screen is still dead after charging the device, the next good thing to do is see if it works on safe mode. If it does, that means that a third party app is causing the problem. Sometimes, a poorly coded app may interfere with Android or with other apps.

To boot the device to Safe Mode:

  1. Turn the device off.
  2. Press and hold the Power key past the model name screen.
  3. When “SAMSUNG” appears on the screen, release the Power key.
  4. Immediately after releasing the Power key, press and hold the Volume down key.
  5. Continue to hold the Volume down key until the device finishes restarting.
  6. Safe mode will display in the bottom left corner of the screen.
  7. Release the Volume down key when you see Safe Mode.

To identify which of your apps is causing the trouble, you should boot the phone back to safe mode and follow these steps:

  1. Boot to safe mode.
  2. Check for the problem.
  3. Once you’ve confirmed that a third party app is to blame, you can start uninstalling apps individually. We suggest that you begin with the most recent ones you added.
  4. After you uninstall an app, restart the phone to normal mode and check for the problem.
  5. If your S10 is still problematic, repeat steps 1-4.

Run device to alternate boot modes (Recovery or Odin). If nothing works after attempting a forced reboot, the other troubleshooting step to do is to restart the device to either Recovery Mode or Odin Mode or both. If the screen works in any of these software environments, there must be a problem with Android operating system.

How to boot a Galaxy S10 to Recovery Mode

  1. Turn off the device. This is important. If you can’t turn it off, you’ll never be able to boot to Recovery Mode. If you are not able to shut the device off regularly via the Power button, wait until the phone’s battery is drained. Then, charge the phone for 30 minutes before booting to Recovery Mode.
  2. Press and hold the Volume Up key and the Bixby key, then press and hold the Power key.
  3. When the green Android logo displays, release all keys (‘Installing system update’ will show for about 30 – 60 seconds before showing the Android system recovery menu options).

How to boot a Galaxy S10 to Download Mode

  1. Turn off the device. This is important. If you can’t turn it off, you’ll never be able to boot to Recovery Mode. If you are not able to shut the device off regularly via the Power button, wait until the phone’s battery is drained. Then, charge the phone for 30 minutes before booting to Recovery Mode.
  2. Press and hold the Volume Down key and the Bixby key, then press and hold the Power key.
  3. You’ll know if you’re on Download Mode when you see a screen that says “Downloading….”
  4. Remember, if the screen works in any of these modes, that’s a clear sign that you have an Android OS issue. Be sure to factory reset the device in Recovery Mode to fix it.

Master reset. If your phone screen works on Recovery Mode, that means that there may be an unknown Android error causing the issue. To fix the problem, you need to master reset the device. Unfortunately, you will be unable to back your personal data up at this point since the screen won’t work on normal mode in the first place.

To master reset your Galaxy S10:

  1. Turn off the device.
  2. Press and hold the Volume Up key and the Bixby key, then press and hold the Power key.
  3. When the green Android logo displays, release all keys (‘Installing system update’ will show for about 30 – 60 seconds before showing the Android system recovery menu options).
  4. Press the Volume down key several times to highlight ‘wipe data / factory reset’.
  5. Press Power button to select.
  6. Press the Volume down key until ‘Yes — delete all user data’ is highlighted.
  7. Press Power button to select and start the master reset.
  8. When the master reset is complete, ‘Reboot system now’ is highlighted.
  9. Press the Power key to restart the device.

Get help from Samsung. If the screen is still non-functional at this time, the reason for it probably beyond your ability to address. It can be a complete screen assembly failure or a coding glitch. We recommend that you bring your device to your local Samsung Service Center so they can check it.

 


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