system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: why does a phone’s battery keep working if plugged in just before dying, but takes a few minutes to turn back on if plugged in after dying?
gpt
Because once the phone dies, it needs to boot back up.

That boot up process is a bit more sensitive, a crash/the phone shutting down again during a boot up could possibly corrupt the files needed to run the boot. If that happens, you’re just dead in the water.

So, smartphones will refuse to turn back on right away, allowing the battery to get enough charge that it definitely won’t die while booting up even if you unplug it again.