A breaker keeps tripping. What it means.

Reset it once, properly: push it fully to off, then back to on. If it holds, note what was running when it went. If it trips again immediately, or trips again within minutes, stop. Repeatedly resetting a breaker that keeps going is overriding the one device standing between a fault and a fire.

Three different devices, three different meanings

Look at what actually tripped, because they mean different things.

An ordinary breaker trips on overload or short circuit. Too much current for too long, or a live conductor touching a neutral or ground.

A GFCI, the outlet or breaker with test and reset buttons, trips when current is leaking to ground, which is what happens when electricity finds a path through water or through a person. A GFCI tripping is usually telling you about moisture or a faulty appliance, and it is protecting a life rather than a wire.

An AFCI, common on bedroom and living area circuits in newer installations, trips when it detects the signature of arcing. Arc faults are the ones that start fires, and AFCIs are also known for nuisance tripping on certain motors and cheap electronics, which does not mean you should ignore them.

Working out which it is, in order

1. When does it trip?

• Immediately on reset, with nothing plugged in: a fault in the fixed wiring. Electrician.
• Immediately when a particular thing is switched on: that appliance or its cord.
• After several minutes of normal use: overload.
• Only in wet weather, or only when using an outdoor or bathroom outlet: moisture, and probably a GFCI doing its job.
• Randomly, with no pattern: a loose connection, which is the one that also produces heat. If there is any burning smell, that is a different page.

2. Isolate it. Unplug everything on that circuit, reset, and add things back one at a time, waiting between each. Tedious and conclusive.

3. Count what is on it. Circuits are shared across rooms in ways that are rarely obvious. A bedroom circuit may also feed a hallway and half of another room. The usual overload culprits are portable heaters, air conditioners, microwaves, kettles, hair dryers, and workshop tools, and two of them on one circuit is often the whole answer.

Portable heaters, specifically

They are the most common single cause of winter tripping, and the most common cause of electrical fires in cold months. One typically draws close to the entire capacity of an ordinary circuit on its own.

• One heater per circuit, never two.
• Plugged straight into a wall outlet, never into an extension cord or a power strip.
• Never into an outlet that is already warm. More on running one safely.

When it is the breaker itself

Breakers do wear out, particularly after many trips, and a weak one can trip below its rating. This is a real thing and it is also the explanation people reach for first because it is the cheapest. It should be the conclusion after the circuit has been checked, not the assumption before.

Call an electrician when

• It trips with nothing plugged in.
• It trips immediately every time.
• There is any smell, warmth, discoloration, or sound at the panel or an outlet.
• A GFCI will not reset at all, which often means it has detected a genuine fault, or the GFCI itself has failed.
• The panel is a brand with a known safety history. Some panels from particular decades have documented failure to trip problems, and an electrician will tell you in a minute whether yours is one.
• You are adding load because the house has changed: an electric vehicle charger, a workshop, a heat pump. That is a capacity question rather than a fault.

What an electrician should actually do

Test the circuit rather than swap the breaker. Ask for the load measured under use, the connections checked along the circuit and in the panel, and an insulation test if a fault is suspected. Ask for it in writing.

If the answer is that the house needs another circuit, that is a normal outcome in a house whose electrical system was designed before anyone owned this many appliances.

The short version

Reset once, properly. If it goes straight back, stop and find out why. Learn which device tripped, because a GFCI and an AFCI are telling you completely different things from an ordinary breaker. Never fit a larger breaker to make it stop, and never put a heater on an extension cord.