Water Resistance Tester checks your phone’s waterproofing without water

Water Resistance Tester, available on the Google Play store and spotted by Android Police, falls firmly into the category of “neat stuff we didn’t know you could do with an app.” It tests the integrity of your Android phone’s IP67/IP68 rating by accessing the device’s barometer. Just download the free app, follow the prompts to press down firmly on the screen, and you’ll get a swift pass/fail grade. It’s simple, geeky, and practical, which is a combination we love.

Developer Ray Wang says he created the app to help people check the state of their devices’ waterproof sealing after a repair or as it degrades over time. Obviously, don’t take a passing grade as a free pass to chuck your phone into a lake. That said, it appears to work reliably, based on feedback from Reddit users and Play store reviewers — as well as our own quick testing. An IP68-rated Galaxy Note 20 Ultra passed the test at first, but when we popped out the SIM card tray, it failed — as you’d expect. A TCL 20 Pro 5G, which has no IP rating, failed.

Images: Allison Johnson / The Verge

This app isn’t the first of its kind, but some of the existing waterproof test apps on the Play store appear to have been designed for older phones with a different style of waterproofing than used in phones today, and may not work accurately now, according to user reviews.

In any case, this new app seems to work well, and it’s free unless you want to tip the developer $1 to remove a small ad at the bottom of the screen. Not a bad price to pay for a little bit of geeky fun.