I rescued my water-damaged phone thanks to Android's powerful accessibility features and open-source app replacements. Tips for Android 13 or newer.
Water Damage and what it taught me
Pinch-to-zoom is efficient for many users, but it excludes others: people with motor impairments, temporary injuries, or damaged hardware. Hardware is not equally waterproof everywhere. Replacing a touchscreen can be more expensive than buying a new smartphone. Android apps, features and workarounds help using a slightly broken smartphone without repair or replacement.
- Course of Events and Extent of Destruction
- One-Finger Zoom Gestures: Double Tap vs. Double Touch Drag
- Android Accessibility Menu
- App Accessibility by Design: Maps and Camera Apps
- Working around Unresponsive Touch Points
- Water Resistance, Rust Protection and eSIM
- What did NOT Work and Why it Failed
- Notes, Credits and Conclusions
Course of Events and Extent of Destruction
After suffering severe water damage, my Google Pixel phone worked again and the touch screen seemed to operate normally in some apps. Others didn't properly recognise gestures like pinch, punch, drag and drop fully anymore, either ignoring my intent or not working as smoothly as before. It took me some research and observation to understand the seemingly erratic behavior.
Unlike the last time when I had to use my device in heavy rain and I had to replace the whole touchscreen, this time the device fell into the water completely. I rescued it quickly and dryed it as good as I could.
A single unresponsive touchscreen row stops drag and drop gestures, but why does pinch zoom no longer work at all? I still don't know, but I learned how to use a phone without two-finger zoom.
As the Pixel 4 is one of the last compact high end smartphone series, and it still works well otherwise unless you need much memory for editing video or a bigger battery. However, replacing the touchscreen costs as much as buying a similar new phone. Let's explore how to make use of the working hardware as a sustainable developer.
One-Finger Zoom Gestures
Android, and possibly other smartphone systems as well, offer at least two alternative zoom gestures that do not require using two fingers. They require only one point of contact, bypassing multi-touch detection issues.
Double Tap
A double tap without additional action toggles 1x zoom in Google photos. This well-known feature keeps zooming deeper into Maps on each tap without a simple way to zoom out again.
Double Touch Drag
The one-finger zoom gesture is a little known alternative to the common two-finger pinch zoom, also known as the one-finger-workaround: Double-tap the screen, but don't lift your finger on the second tap. Slide your finger up or down to zoom in and out.
App Support and Limitations
One-finger tap gestures work in Google Maps, Photos and Camera, although it opens Camera settings, it still zooms in and out nevertheless. It also works in Seznam's Open Street Map based MAPY app and in all Android apps that don't prevent or intercept double tap with their own handler.
Tapping twice with or without secondary one finger swipe is not working in Instagram, where double tapping means to like or unlike a post, and double-touch-dragging in the post and stories editor does exactly nothing. But Meta's notorious disregard for accessibility is not the only reason against Instagram anyway.
Android Accessibility Menu
Turning on the Accessibility Menu shortcut in Settings > Accessibility > Accessibility Menu., a large floating button appeared. Tapping it opens another large-button menu. However, I failed to add or activate zoom buttons missing in the default accessibility menu. There is a distinct magnification tool that enables zooming into the whole screen and adds a draggable square screen loupe, independent from missing app functionality.
Ironically, Google's AI assistant advised me to disable magnification. That's unnecessary as it only conflicts with one-finger tap-and-drag while the loupe is active. The accessibility menu does not contain big "+" and "-" buttons to zoom, at least not without further customization (comments welcome!)
App Accessibility by Design
Many apps used to include optional plus (+) and minus (-) zoom buttons specifically for accessibility and users with limited hand mobility who are physically unable to make pinch and punch gestures with their fingers.
Navigation Apps with or without Zoom Buttons
I failed to find the "hidden setting" to turn on permanent zoom buttons in the Google Maps app to show up on the right side of the map, formerly found after tapping my profile icon, going to settings -> navigation settings as a Show zoom buttons toggle.
Google had removed the button option from the Google Maps app in a past update. As an alternative, Google's Gemini AI assistant highly recommended switching to the open street map client OsmAnd as the "gold standard for accessibility. It uses large, high-contrast + and - buttons by default and allows you to place them anywhere on the screen."
OsmAnd and Open Camera interface and settings with Android accessibility menu and magnifier buttons floating on top of the apps on the right side.
Photo & Camera Apps with Zoom Buttons
Open Camera is a professional camera app that is much easier to use with hardware damage or accessibility needs than Google Camera. I had already installed Open Camera before, because of its explicit external microphone settings for recording video.
Open camera has volume key zoom using the phone's physical volume buttons and a large on-screen slider for zooming without using pinch gestures. Open camera has many "more camera controls" in its settings menu. It's probably one of the most customizable open source camera app according to my own experience.
Improving Privacy by Design
Switching to the open street map client OsmAnd from Google Maps and replacing Google Camera with Open Camera app also provides privacy by design.
Working Around Unresponsive Touch Points
Button taps are not affected as long as buttons are big enough.
Android app icon drag and drop positioning becomes a puzzle game when you can't drop to a certain x,y position by moving from above because an unresponsive cell acts like an invisible wall on your way to the intended drop target.
If you enjoyed those kind of games, you can imagine possible solutions. When you can't drag from top down, try to find a way from bottom up, like removing and re-adding the same app shortcut icon.
Cursor placement and text selection are restricted by the unresponsive row as well. A workaround is scrolling. In my notes app, I sometimes add two extra lines to make the note long enough for scrolling to work.
Water Resistance and Rust Protection
Pro tip: Don't drop your phone into the water!
Avoid using your phone while it's wet. Wait until it's dry instead.
But if you do, Android can automatically disable the USB slot when it detects humidity to protect an otherwise vulneraby exposed electrical port capable of destroying the device electronic.
Physical hardware SIM card slots and SIM cards can get damaged by corrosion as well. Luckily, there is eSIM now.
eSIM as an easy solution?
A subscriber identity module, or SIM for short, is the historic micro chip card you buy at a bodega (Späti) or phone shop or obtain postal mail from your phone provider. Most customers don't need it at all. The embedded software replacement (eSIM) is available in almost all modern smartphones and many recent precursors, including my Pixel 4a which was originally manufactured in 2020.
What did NOT Work and Why it Failed
Asking AI assistants about settings can be informative, inspiring or misleading. Infamously overconfident about their suggestions and hallucinations, asking for proof and authoritative sources produced a "why this works" section, no matter if it does, even when it's clear that they can't be sure.
We should all know that AI is unreliable, but some suggestions sound too good to be true or too scary to ignore.
Incorrectly Attributed Issues
Perplexity claimed that my Pixel 4a was one of those models not supporting virtual SIM card software, attributing Pixel 3a information to the Pixel 4a series. All Pixel 4a phones should support eSIM, just as Gemini and Google Help seemed to agree on initially. If mine had not, in the worst case, I would have had to order a new physical hardware SIM card from my phone provider.
Always check authoritative sources and product specifications!
Imaginary System Settings
Gemini was initially right about the eSIM issue but changed its mind after evaluating Perplexity's claims. Gemini later hallucinated system settings and app options that don't exist. The artistic recap below illustrates imaginary system settings and proves that AI is still better at imagination than at researching facts correctly.
These imaginary system settings look nice and graphical, but that's not the point. Searching for nonexistant settings that were either removed or never implemented is a waste of time. Here are some screenshots of the real Android 13 system settings.
Below is another informative screenshot collage taken on Android 13 on a Google Pixel phone in 2026. The image might be outdated when you read it, but it proves that there are no zoom buttons in Google Map settings in the mobile Android app anymore.
Neither Google Maps Go, nor the Open Street Maps based czech Mapy app offer accessible zoom buttons, but OsmAnd does. Official documentation, forums and search results can point you in the right direction. But there are so many different system configurations and frequent software updates that not every experience or official documentation might work in your specific situation. Instead of relying on rumors and guessing, I find it's always a good idea to inspect and learn about the apps that you have and check for useful options that you might have been missing.
Screen Protector Mode to Enhance Touch Sensitivity
Android settings offer a so-called screen protector mode to ehance touch sensitivity. Originally intended to compensate weaker contact caused by protective plastic or glass applied to the touchscreen, screen protector mode might also help in other situations.
To increase touch sensitivity, go to Settings > Display > Touch sensitivity and toggle the Screen protector mode to ON. Forcing the digitizer to detect weaker signals might bypass minor input issues.
In my case, this did not fix the partial unresponsiveness caused by the water damage. In fact, I perceived no difference at all. But at least the protector mode is a system setting that really exists and didn't hurt to give it it a try.
Disable Magnification
Android Accessibility and magnification button overlays don't interfere with other apps any more than they need to. Unless activated, the magnification button just sits on the side of the screen, can be dragged out of the way and does nothing until you touch it.
A "top priority" according to AI, the advice to disable magnification was probably a mistake confusing the overlay button with another, even less known gesture refered to as a triple-tap to zoom, breaking an otherwise functioning pinch-to-zoom gesture.
Anyway, toggling the maginifcation shortcut setting to OFF in Settings > Accessibility > Magnification did not help me in any way.
Android System Intelligence Cache
AI also advised me to clear the Android System Intelligence cache, based on "reasoning" about possible "cached error states" that turned out as mere speculation. Interestingly, there is a system app called System Intelligence on my phone that I had already disabled before. What does it do?
Suspicious Agent or Helpful Assistant?
Android System Intelligence is supposed to provide helpful intelligent assistance locally while respecting users' privacy. According to Google Help, Android System Intelligence features include automatic live captions, assistant voice typing, language translation and music recognition and smart autorotate.
However, in times of growing concerns about reliance on American tech companies and so-called artificial intelligence, disabling an unsolicited Google system app is legitimate action to degoogle your Android device at least a little bit without switching to pure Android Open Source (AOSP) alternatives completely (which might not be a good idea anyway if you rely on online banking and other commercial apps that expect a Google-based infrastructure to be part of a legitime end-user device).
I can assure you that at least autorotate works in Android 13 when system intelligence is disabled. Although the help article does not mention touch sensitivity and gestures explicitly anywhere, there might be some connection that I didn't proceed to explore.
Notes, Credits and Conclusions
Both fascinated and critical about AI-generated art let my disclose, disclaim and clarify image sources, facts, and (mis)information used in this article.
AI-Generated Images
Except for the real screenshots, all images used in this article have been generated with the help of AI, either using Google's Nano Banana via the Forem cover generator, as it is currently encouraged by DEV, or by OpenAI's ChatGPT partially based on actual photography showing myself and generated cover images.
AI Information, Misinformation and Text Generation
Misinformation, misattribution and hallucinations wasted precious time and energy and made-up recommendations did not work and some even made the situation worse. I haven't cited all of them so as not to inspire anyone to harmful actions.
However, experimenting with AI as a developer can teach us what AI can do, what it can't do, and how to spot fakes and hallucinations.
Conclusions
- Don't trust AI.
- Don't rely on Google.
- Don't ditch a working device before trying repair and recovery.
- Alternative Open Source Apps are worth a try.
- Accidents can make me learn something new.
- Accessibility can benefit everyone.
- Always be skeptical.
- Don't let your device drop into the water.
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