Last Updated on October 4, 2026 by Umar Farooq
Samsung dryer error codes are not the same list as Samsung washer error codes, and the overlap is what costs people the afternoon. Both machines put dC on the display. Both use 3C. Samsung publishes the two sets on two separate pages, with different groupings and different sibling codes, precisely because a character that means one thing on a washer means something adjacent-but-different on a dryer. If you are standing at a dryer with a washer code chart open, you are reading the wrong document.
Samsung’s own dryer page sorts its codes into eleven groups rather than alphabetically, and that grouping is the useful part. It tells you which system reported the fault before you know anything else about the machine. The wording below is Samsung’s, read on the page itself. Where Samsung publishes nothing beyond a label, this page says so rather than filling the gap from a parts catalogue.
One thing first, because it is the only code on this list where the obvious move is the wrong one.
dn is the one code where cutting the power is a mistake
Nearly every dryer code on every brand responds to a power cycle, which is why “unplug it” is the universal first instruction in this whole category. Samsung’s dn is the exception, and it is worth knowing before you reach behind the machine. The code means the dryer is in the middle of installing its own firmware, and Samsung notes that the time required “can vary” with file size and connection speed — so a panel sitting on dn for a while is not a panel that has frozen.
Samsung’s warning here is unusually direct for a manufacturer: “Do not unplug or shut off power to the dryer while this code is displayed. Doing so may cause the dryer to become inoperable and require service.” The brand that normally tells you to reset first is telling you to leave the breaker alone. There is a deadline attached, too — if dn is still showing after 24 hours, that is the point at which it becomes a service call rather than a wait.
The practical consequence is small and worth adopting anyway: read the display before you reach for the plug, not after.
The eleven groups Samsung dryer error codes split into
The reason Samsung groups these rather than listing them alphabetically is that the sibling codes inside a group are usually one condition rendered on different display generations and different panel widths. tS, t5, tC, tO, t0, tE, tE3, tC5, tCS and their leading-1 variants are a single temperature condition, not nine faults. Working out which of the nine you have is wasted effort. Working out which group you are in is the job.
There is one piece of display trivia on Samsung’s page that no competing code list carries, and it rescues a whole family from being looked up under the wrong brand. Samsung writes: “If you see something that looks like an upside down ‘F,’ it’s meant to be a ‘t.'” On a seven-segment display an inverted F and a lower-case t are the same shape — and F codes on a dryer belong to Whirlpool Corporation, not to Samsung. A letter orientation has sent people reading the wrong manufacturer’s documentation.
Here is the set, grouped as Samsung groups it, with Samsung’s wording wherever Samsung provides wording.
| Group | Codes Samsung lists | Samsung’s own wording | What it usually turns out to be |
|---|---|---|---|
| Door | dC dE dF do d0 1 DC 1 dF | “These are related to the door, its latch, and the sensors that detect whether they are secured correctly.” | Laundry trapped in the opening, or a latch that looks shut and never confirmed |
| Temperature | tS t5 tC tO t0 tE tE3 tC5 tCS 1 tC 1tC5 1tCS | “These reflect an issue with the temperature or with the sensors that measure it.” Cause: “a clogged lint screen or vent system trapping heat in the dryer” | Airflow. Samsung names the lint screen and the vent before it names anything electrical |
| Heating | HC hE HC4 1 HC | “This means that the dryer is getting too hot.” | The same restriction as the temperature group, reported from the other side |
| Voltage | 9C1 9E 2E 9E1 | “This code appears when something is abnormal with the voltage being supplied to the dryer.” | An extension cord, a shared circuit, or a power cord terminal never tightened |
| Jammed button | bE bE2 bC2 6E 6E2 6C2 | “This appears if a button on the panel is detected as stuck or continuously pressed.” | A membrane button not returning, or moisture behind the panel |
| Communication | AC Et AE EEE AE4 AE3 AE5 E3 1 AC | “This code means the dryer’s internal components cannot communicate with each other.” | A connector between two boards far more often than a board |
| Frequency | FC FE 1 FC | “These codes mean that there is an invalid power source frequency.” | A supply problem, or a machine carried between countries |
| Vent blockage results | Clg Cl9 Cg C9 C80 C8o C8 C90 C9o Ct C1 CL1 | “These codes will only appear after a Vent Blockage test has been run.” | Not faults. Measurements of your ductwork |
| Firmware download | dn | “This code means a download to the dryer’s firmware is in progress.” | Wait it out. Do not cut the power |
| Child Lock | CL | “Child Lock prevents children from accidentally opening or controlling the dryer by disabling the control panel’s buttons.” | Not a fault at all |
| All other errors | 3C oD 1 AC7 HC2 | “Motor Error” / “Dry Time Error” / “Electronic Control Error” / “Gas Ignition Error” | Four codes, four labels, no further text published |
Two display habits worth keeping. Samsung prefixes a leading 1 on some stacked and multi-unit configurations, so 1 tC and tC are one condition reported by a different control. And Samsung states plainly that models without a digital readout “will display error codes as blinking lights instead” — so a dryer with no screen is still reporting, just in a vocabulary that lives in your model’s manual and in no general chart.
Two whole groups are measurements, not faults
The Clg / C80 / C90 group is the most misread thing on Samsung’s dryer list, because the codes look exactly like fault codes and behave nothing like them. They appear only after you deliberately run a Vent Blockage test — a diagnostic you start on purpose. Power the dryer on, then within five seconds hold Adjust Time Up and Dry Level until InS or In appears, then hold Start. Samsung puts the run time at about two minutes.
What comes back is a reading of your ductwork, with a number attached: “Clg, Cg : The vent is clogged.” / “C80, C8 : About 80% of the vent is clogged.” / “C90, C9 : Over 90% of the vent is clogged.” A dryer reporting C80 has not developed a fault. It has told you, for free and in under two minutes, that four-fifths of your exhaust run is lint — which is more measurement than most paid diagnostics produce.
Two of the results in that group describe the test rather than the duct. C1 or CL1 means laundry is in the drum and the test needs an empty one. Ct means the dryer is below freezing or above 104 °F, and Samsung’s instruction is to wait an hour at room temperature. Neither is a dryer problem; both are the machine declining to measure badly. The cleaning method itself is in how to clean a dryer vent.
Four codes get a label and nothing else
Under “All other errors”, Samsung names four codes and then stops. 3C is “Motor Error”. oD is “Dry Time Error”. 1 AC7 is “Electronic Control Error”. HC2 is “Gas Ignition Error”. That is the published definition in full — two or three words each, with no cause, no check and no procedure attached. Samsung’s blanket instruction for all four is to “power off the dryer for 2-3 minutes, power it back on, and restart the cycle”, then consult the manual for the specific model.
Saying so is more useful than appearing to know more. Every page that offers you a component for 3C is either guessing or quoting a service manual it has not named, and this site has been burned by exactly that: the quotation "Mems sensor or vibration sensor error" circulated for years on Samsung washer 8C pages, including two of ours, and it exists on no Samsung page anywhere. A definition taken from a search snippet has no source behind it.
What you can do with a four-word label is narrow it by behaviour instead. 3C on a drum that will not move at all is a different proposition from 3C on a drum that turns and then stops, and why a Samsung dryer is not spinning separates those two before any part gets considered.
Three reset waits, and the famous one belongs to the washer
Samsung’s own documentation disagrees with itself here, and it matters because the wrong wait makes a successful reset look like a failed one. Samsung gives 30 seconds at the breaker for confirming a half-tripped 240 V circuit, 60 seconds unpowered for a panel that will not respond, and 2 to 3 minutes for a code already on the display. Three pages, three numbers, all live on Samsung US.
The widely quoted “1 to 5 minutes at most” is Samsung’s washing machine reset guidance and appears on no dryer page. Using it does no harm — a longer wait never hurts a control board — but it is the same drift that puts washer code meanings onto dryer pages, and it is worth naming out loud rather than repeating.
A reset is not a repair in any case. It clears a stored state, and the machine then re-tests the condition that produced it. If the same code lands at the same point in the cycle twice, the reset worked perfectly and the fault is real. That is the moment to stop power-cycling and start looking at airflow.
A panel that ignores you is probably locked
CL sits on Samsung’s error code page and is not an error. Child Lock disables the panel buttons and, Samsung notes, “on some models, Child Lock may also lock the door” — which is exactly why a locked dryer reads as a door fault, or as a dead control board, to anyone who has not spotted the lit icon.
Samsung’s own description of that icon is worth having, because it is not what you would guess: “the Child Lock icon may look like a baby or a lock with a smiley face.” The release is a two-button hold, and Samsung is candid that it cannot tell you which two. “The exact buttons will vary between models, but two common combinations are Temp and Time, or Dry Level and Temp. Your control panel will indicate which two buttons to use.”
One more non-fault, and it only happens on stacked pairs joined by a multi-control kit. Samsung records that the washer “may report that the dryer has a 9C1 error if you try to control the dryer within 5 seconds of turning the washer on”. A voltage code produced entirely by being five seconds too eager. A software update through SmartThings clears it.
Five Samsung conditions that outrank the display
Most codes on this list are the dryer refusing to proceed, which is a safety system working. A few are not, and these outrank whatever the display says.
- A burning smell, or smoke. On a gas dryer Samsung’s instruction is to clear the building of all occupants and contact emergency services, not to troubleshoot.
- Any burn mark or visible damage at the power cord, the outlet or the terminal block. Switch off at the breaker first. Samsung names this as a stop-and-call-an-electrician condition.
- A breaker that trips again after being reset. It is doing its job. Re-arming it repeatedly is the wrong response every time.
- A heating or temperature code that returns after the lint screen and the full exhaust run are confirmed clear. The restriction is somewhere you cannot reach, or it is not a restriction.
- A voltage code alongside lights dimming elsewhere in the house. That is the building’s supply, not the dryer.
The display narrows it to a system; the vent narrows it to a fix
Two of Samsung’s eleven groups are given the same primary cause in Samsung’s own words, and a third group exists purely to measure that cause in percentages. Four codes get a two-word label and nothing more. One code asks you to put the plug down and wait.
So the honest reading of this list is that Samsung’s dryer codes point at airflow far more often than they point at parts, and Samsung’s own instructions say so before they say anything about components. Clean the screen, run the vent test, read the number it hands back. If the code survives all three, you have learned something expensive but true: it was never the vent.
FAQ
Is a Samsung dryer code the same as the same code on a Samsung washer?
No, and Samsung publishes them on two separate pages for that reason. The door groups overlap on dC and dE but carry different sibling codes, the washer’s 8E2 jammed-button trap has no dryer equivalent, and dn, HC, oD and the vent-blockage results exist only on the dryer list.
What is the most common Samsung dryer error code?
The temperature and heating groups — tC, tS, HC and their siblings. Samsung gives both the same leading cause in its own words: a clogged lint screen or vent system trapping heat inside the machine.
How do I clear a code on a Samsung dryer?
For a code already on the display, Samsung’s instruction is to power the dryer off for two to three minutes, power it back on and restart the cycle. There is no live Samsung US article dedicated to resetting a dryer, and the “1 to 5 minutes” figure quoted everywhere comes from Samsung’s washer guidance.
My Samsung dryer shows C80. Is that a fault?
No. It is the result of a Vent Blockage test, and Samsung reads it as roughly 80% of the exhaust duct blocked. C90 means over 90%. Clean the lint filter and the exhaust run, then run the test again.
Why does my dryer show dn and ignore the buttons?
It is installing firmware. Samsung’s caution is explicit: do not unplug or cut power while dn is displayed, because doing so may leave the dryer inoperable. If it is still showing after 24 hours, request service.
My Samsung dryer has no display, just lights. Where is the code?
The blinking pattern is the code. Samsung states that models without a digital display “will display error codes as blinking lights instead”. Record the pattern on video before you cut power, then match it in your own model’s manual — general charts do not transfer between Samsung dryer lines.
Samsung only gives two words for my code. What now?
Then two words is what exists, and anything longer you find elsewhere is unsourced. Note the exact characters and the point in the cycle where the dryer stopped. That pair is what a technician actually needs, and it is more than the display gave you.
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Samsung’s dryer list is honest about its own limits in a way the pages ranking above it are not: eleven groups, four labels with nothing attached, and one code that asks you to stand back. Record the characters, run the vent test, and let the machine give you a number before you give it a part.
Sources opened for this page: Samsung, dryer displays an error code · Samsung, run a Vent Blockage test on your Samsung dryer · Samsung, control buttons on Samsung dryer do not respond · Samsung, dryer loses power or will not turn on. All four read live on 3 October 2026.
