What to do when your Nokia Lumia 800 will not turn on?

Nokia Lumia 800: delightful smartphone but with a few irritations. If you have one, I recommend that you do not let the battery fully discharge – a challenge since the battery life is not the greatest – since if you do, you may have problems turning the phone on again.

I am not sure what proportion of Lumias are affected, but what happens is this. The battery runs out and the phone turns itself off as you would expect. You plug it into the charger, but even after several hours it appears to remain uncharged and will not turn on. The problem is discussed in this thread: Lumia 800 won’t power on or charge.

This has happened with my review Lumia. In my case, the phone vibrated when plugged into the charger and the charging screen appeared, with a red line showing an empty battery, and there it stayed.

So what is the fix? I have had the problem a couple of times, and each time it eventually fixed itself, though it is hard to pinpoint the exact fix. Things people have tried:

  • Unplugging and reconnecting the charger to the phone
  • Attaching the phone to a PC, then to a charger
  • Reset the charging cycle by holding down the power button, while charging, for 8 seconds or so
  • Warming the device to create a small charge in the battery, then starting to charge it

One theory is the battery discharges so deeply that there is not enough power to detect the charger, therefore it never charges. Kind-of too smart for its own good.

If the phone had a removable battery, I would suggest removing and replacing it, an old trick to revive a frozen phone. Should your Lumia not be covered by a warranty, you could try disassembly in order to do this.

The best hope is that a further firmware update will fix the problem.

129 thoughts on “What to do when your Nokia Lumia 800 will not turn on?”

  1. My nokia lumia 800 died and would not turn back on, i tried almost everything people suggested on these forms but nothing worked. This went on for at least 8 hours. I seen a tip to heat the phone up, so connected the phone to my laptop using the usb wire and i simply placed the phone under my laptop while it was on ( as it heats up) and within 10-15 secs it started to charge up again . Hope these helps someone else 🙂

      1. Glad it helped I was so stressed when it happened to me. NEVER let the battery go dead, when it does i have to do this its such a pain! Make sure you charge it straight away when the critically low warning come up.

  2. i also encountered problems on my phone nokia lumia 800, i received text messages and even phone call, but there’s no screen dispaly..the problem was how to answer the phone and read the messages without screen display….i did not used my phone for 1 hour,,,,then wow after an hour ,my phone was back to normal……i experienced this 2 times….

  3. After much frustration (mine) and intermittent vibrations (phone) I pushed all the buttons for about 10 secs and it showed the ‘connected to computer’ screen. I then charged it on an iphone charger for about an hour and a half and hey presto, sleeping beauty awoke.

  4. my dear friends if your lumia 800 is not turning on then just try this what i am going to tell you, your phone will start again,

    •Connect the phone to your computer with a USB cable that came in the sales package with your Lumia phone. If the battery has not been used for a long time, to begin charging, you may need to connect the cable, then disconnect and reconnect it.

    •Press and hold the Power button for 10 seconds, and then press to turn on your phone again.

    •Your PC should detect your phone when it is connected using a USB cable, if this is not happening you can manually switch the phone into specific mode following these steps:
    1. Disconnect your phone from the USB cable.
    2. Hold down the camera button.
    3. Continue holding down the camera button and connect the USB cable between your phone and PC.
    4. Continue holding down the camera button until you see the connect-to-computer screen on your Lumia phone display.
    5. Release the camera button.
    6. The Zune software on the PC should automatically detect your phone now and charging indicator appears on the display.

    it will help you my dear friends , thanks alot,
    iamauk. http://www.facebook.com/attaullahbhatti

    1. Hi I did all the steps yet, even though the pc recognises the phone the screen is still black. What can I do please? Just owned it for less than a month…..

  5. Hey, I am having the same problem with my lumia 800. I connected it to my laptop and updated it, updating turned it off and i had to turn it back on. I kept getting “low battery” icon, but now it only shakes. I have tried holding power button for 8+ secends and power+voice down buttons.

    1. This conversation makes clear that Nokia sells crap. Sometimes, it helps if you push some, many or all buttons, or connect, disconnect and reconnect it to your computer, while simultaneously pushing buttons on your phone, like I did and iamouk in another order. However, this is not a Nokia built-in procedure, but just a random activation of a rest of power. We just did a wrong purchase.

  6. ..cont.

    My phone just turned on after disconnecting and pressing power button. It displays icon of phone and laptop connected with arrow crossed on top of it. Im not sure if that means I need to connect it or not.

    When my phone is charging, it keeps shaking. I unplugged it as im going to sleep, I’ll check how its doing tomorrow.

  7. I have a Nokia 800 and it is dead. I had it charging overnight ok, checked the phone before i left for work and during the 20 minute car ride it died. I have tried all of the prssing button combinations and it is still dead. I have tried two Nokia chargers and also connecting it to either my laptop or computer…. nothing. Either computer or laptop does not recognise the phone. My only concern is the photos on the phone. I thought that it may have a micro SD card inside but no. I am going to try a more powerful charger (as suggested on here) maybe a 2amp output and see what happens. I am also wonderi ng if its worth buying a new battery off ebay just to see if brings my phone back to life even just to get the pictures off. I will keep you posted.

  8. i have tried everything you can find on the web
    hard en soft reset and warming the phone up
    mij computer doesnt recognize my phone
    its now for 2 weeks like this
    does somebody nows a other trick i can try
    thinks

  9. I am thinking about buying a replacement battery off ebay. I am suprised that nobody has suggested replacing the battery or even tried a replacment battery.

  10. My Lumia wouldn’t turn on after I turned it off and I was so scared! But I held down the volume and power button together for a while…AND IT TURNED ON!
    YAY! I also connected it to my PC and it took a while to recognize the device but YAY!
    Back in business.

  11. Well, just an update… I took my telephone to a Nokia warranty repair centre in York and they put in their own battery and still it would not power on. So I am f”c£ed. All of my photos gone. There only suggestion was to try and “Force” software onto the phone but after asking “how can you force software on a dead device?” the technician said we just can! I did not go for that option as it would wipe everything. So now I am looking for someone who can do data recovery.

  12. I took out my sim card and put it back in again…then held down the power button and she was back on again.

  13. HI,i had the same problem phone would not power on or charge…I wrapped the phone in a cloth and placed on the heater for 20 – 30 mins.. This gave the battery the charge it needed to power on and start charging ,not sure if this is a perminant fix but will give you the chance to retrieve any data.

  14. Thanks a lot! I couldn’t get my Lumia 800 working, I was listening to music when it just powered off. I left it charging for 30 mins and it still wouldn’t even vibrate. The next morning I rubbed the back of the phone and put it in the computer, while holding down the power button and it eventually worked:)

  15. my luma 800 has been dead for 4 hours now.. get it tuned on i thought but only coming up nokia and staying like this..help tips?

  16. My Lumia 800 has been death for almost 2 weeks now after dropping it in the salt water.
    Please someone with quick help and fix ideas. Thanks

  17. I am pretty sure my lumia 800 has kicked the bucket. Time of death last night (almost 20hrs now). In the events leading up to this final catastrophe, I remember that the phone was alarming “battery critically low” but I got distracted and didn’t charge it straight away. When I eventually connected it to the charger it charged up ok and it was more than 50% charged when I disconnected it to use it for a quick web search…which went well, then it seemed to switch off on its own pretty quick. I thought that was odd, but I hooked it up to the charger again and booted it up, and used the diagnostics tool to check the charge on the battery. This read 87%, so I was worried that something more sinister was going on. Anyway, I wanted to turn the screen off with a quick press of the power button but I fumbled in the dark and pressed the volume down button by mistake… and then it just switched off and wouldn’t turn back on again. I have done EVERYTHING mentioned by everyone in this forum. No spark of life.

    Prior to all this, I have been struggling for weeks with the stupid proximity sensor that played up so I couldn’t access any screen buttons during a call. Was it a related problem??? Hmmm…. a prognostic sign of a dying nokia lumia 800 maybe.

    Nokia…..what can I say…. I was such a nokia fanatic… I had the old nokia phones that you could throw against a wall and after putting all the pieces together they would still work. I got this Lumia 800 thinking about that same robust reliable build quality and dependability. I’m sorry but you haven’t done justice to us Nokia fans who have stuck by you when HTC, Blackberry, Samsung and,…Ughhhhhh… iphone (I’m all for windows and I HATE APPLE) are compelling reasons to switch.

    What an expensive lesson in loyalty to the wrong phone giant.

  18. really pissed off with nokia my 800 just died plenty of advice but nothing fixed the problem i cannot believe that nokia will not take the blame i have my own business with over 200 contacts which i have lost and cannot get back due to the phone deciding to give up nokias comment were we can sell you a new handset or hopefully repair your 800 but as for your contacts well they are gone
    what a big fat load of crap /// you had my money and now trying to screw my business
    modern techno load of crap if you cant back it up tell us before we buy u muppets

  19. Same here with my lumia 800. I’ve had this problem about 2 weeks.
    Tried to charge battery even without phone and checked voltage. 3.8V as it should. So battery is full.
    But still not turning on. There’s still Nokia logo and battery empty pic when there’s no battery in and only connected with a charger. So in my opinion, battery is full but it just can’t connect it somehow. I even flashed it. Nothing seems to work.

  20. Have run into exactly the same problem with a 620. It’s got to be a Nokia firmware problem. Except mine discharged, will not take charge period. Basically bricked at this point.

  21. HI there,
    I Got a nokia luma 800 on a 24 month contract from Tesco I had it for 4 weeks and the battery is dead, I have tried to charge it over night with no joy . I sent it back to be repaired but they sent it back saying it was water damage, when I written back saying it has never been dropped they sent me a letter saying you shouldn’t not use it in the rain. I have never heard something so silly it don’t say anything about not using it in the rain. Reading all the complaint about the lumia Look like it everyone’s fault but nokia . NEVER AGAIN WITH NOKIA OR TESCO

  22. Lumia 620 i took firmware update on a new phone has been great.

    Went to use facebook app loaded but went back to tile screen, tried to use camera that loaded but same again.

    battery was full, so turned off phone and tried to turn it on stuck at nokia screen.

    Tried hard reset and battery charge reset but it wont go past the nokia screen.
    Vibrates when you plug in charger, but nothing as its off pc doesnt find it 🙁

    So looks lime im sending it back to nokia, only had it two weeks too.

    Hopefully they can fix it or send me a new one.

  23. Hey Guys

    My phone has faced this problem twice… On the first time i left it aside for a day and next day it started charging on its own…
    today again i faced the same problem and when i pressed the power button with the volume button and then power button with camera button each for 5 seconds… and then immdiately pressed only power button it switched on !!
    My phone has stopped giving vibrations on power on and charging though… anybody knows how to fix that??

  24. If your phone is unresponsive, you should first try these steps. This does not reset the Microsoft (Windows Live) Account or remove any consumer data.
    Press the Volume Down + Power Key and hold them for 15 seconds.
    You will feel vibration.
    The phone will reset and boot up automatically.
    If the phone does not respond, remove the SIM card and try again.
    When the phone switches on, confirm that it has the latest software version by going to Settings > Phone update, and then tap Check for updates.

  25. Mine doesn’t work at all ive tried every thing but still nothing please help
    ive only had the phone for 6 mounths

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