Don't build your family's plan on your phone

My phone is my torch, my map, my bank, my prayer timetable and my Qur'an. It's also the thing I'd be most wrong to rely on if the power went off for a day or two. I used to assume that in a power cut I'd at least be able to message home and check the news, and the more I've read about how the networks behave, the less sure of that I've become.

What stops, and when

Home broadband goes the moment the lights do, because the router runs on mains power. Unless you've got a portable power station to run it, the Wi-Fi goes with the electricity.

Mobile signal lasts longer, but not by much. Phone masts need power too, and most hold very little in reserve. When Ofcom looked at this in February 2025, around one mast site in five had at least an hour of battery backup, and about one in twenty had six hours. Its updated guidance in June 2026 asks the operators to take "robust measures" against power cuts, and still doesn't set a minimum number of hours.

We've seen how that plays out. During the blackout in Spain and Portugal on 28 April 2025, Ookla's data showed the share of Spanish mobile users with a consistent connection (at least 5 Mbit/s down and 1 Mbit/s up) falling from over 90% at 9am to 40% by 3pm. The network didn't vanish all at once. It faded through the day as the batteries ran down.

The landline isn't the fallback it was. The old copper network is being switched off, and GOV.UK expects the move to digital landlines to be complete for most customers by January 2027. A digital landline runs through your router, so it won't work in a power cut unless it has a battery backup, and telecare alarms on a digital line may stop too. Ofcom's guidance says providers should have at least one way to reach the emergency services for a minimum of an hour in a power cut, free for people at risk because they depend on their landline. If an older relative relies on a landline or a telecare alarm, ring their provider this week and ask what they've got.

And the advice a lot of us grew up with, Radio 4 on long wave, has gone: the BBC switched long wave off on 27 June 2026. A battery or wind-up radio still earns its place, but it needs FM, and DAB if you can get it.

What I'd move onto paper

What all this argues for is moving a few things off the phone while everything still works.

• Agree a first-hour rule. If the power goes and doesn't come back quickly, use the first hour, while there's still some signal, to agree where everyone is and what happens next. After that, assume messages may not get through.
• Write the numbers down. Be Ready asks people to keep important phone numbers on paper, somewhere easy to find in a power cut, and I think it's one of the most useful lines in the campaign. One sheet in every wallet and school bag will do, as long as it includes someone outside your area.
• Choose a meeting point the children can picture, such as a bench they know or the masjid. Children remember a place more easily than an instruction.
• Keep one adult phone switched on for Emergency Alerts, and let the others save their battery. Airplane mode may stop alerts getting through.
• Put an FM radio by the bed, with spare batteries taped to the back.

The gap I can't close

Emergency Alerts reach your phone through the same masts that fade in a long power cut. So the warning system works best in the first few hours, while the network is still healthy, and gets weaker in the long, slow outage when you'd most want news. I don't think any household can fix that. It's the main reason I'd want the radio and the paper sheet, even if you ignore everything else on this page.

Check before you share

When signal is patchy and people are anxious, a rumour can go round the whole family before anyone has checked it. Allah tells us that when someone unreliable brings us news, we should verify it before acting on it, so that we don't harm people out of ignorance (Al-Hujurat 49:6). In a power cut, that means one trusted source at set times, and not forwarding the voice note from a cousin's friend.