Woman Nearly Dies After Unplugged Electric Toothbrush Explodes

A Manchester woman says she’s “lucky to be alive” after her electric toothbrush allegedly exploded and burst into flames while she slept — even though it wasn’t plugged in or charging.

Charlotte Bowers, 33, said she’d used her Oral-B toothbrush with zero issues for about eight months after buying it in May 2025. Then, one morning in February 2026, she walked into her bathroom and saw what she calls a nightmare scene: the toothbrush had apparently blown apart overnight, leaving scorch marks, melted debris, and smoke damage behind.

“It scared the living daylights out of me,” Charlotte said. “I walked into the bathroom one morning and saw my electric toothbrush had exploded in the middle of the night and caught on fire.”

Charlotte, who works for Network Rail, said the brush had been stored in a pot above the sink — away from water — and wasn’t on charge at the time. She also claimed there were no warning signs and nothing unusual about the device before the incident.

“There was no warning, it wasn’t dodgy or anything, it had been completely fine for eight months,” she said. “There’s no way it could have been anything I did, as I always kept it dry and I hadn’t left it on charge.”

Even more alarming, she said the explosion tripped the electrics in the house — but she and her partner didn’t hear a thing during the night.

Charlotte believes one detail may have saved her home from going up in flames: the steel frame of her bathroom mirror.

“I’m very lucky to still be alive because the only thing that prevented the fire from spreading is the steel frame of the mirror,” she said, adding that without it, the flames could have traveled farther up the wall and into the rest of the house.

She said the fire also damaged the extractor fan (which she noted wasn’t switched on), and left the bathroom coated in black smoke. To get rid of the smell and staining, she and her partner repainted the entire room using special paint — a fix she says cost $267.

Charlotte said she contacted Oral-B and asked for compensation to cover the damage. But she claims the response left her furious.

“They offered me $46 for a new toothbrush instead,” she said. “It’s completely insulting, I could be dead. I’m not asking for thousands… I just want them to cover the cost of the paint.”

After the scare, she says she’s done with electric toothbrushes altogether.

“I’m never going to buy anything from Oral B again,” Charlotte said. “I’m never even going near any electric toothbrush again — it’s not worth the risk.”

Oral-B, however, pushed back on the claim that an unplugged brush could be responsible for a fire.

In a statement, a spokesperson said: “We understand how upsetting this experience must have been and take any safety reports very seriously. Though the cause of the fire remains unknown, it’s important to know that an unplugged cordless toothbrush does not contain enough energy to cause a fire.”