Apple will charge more to swap your iPhone 16 Pro battery | Hacker News Reader

Apple will charge more to swap your iPhone 16 Pro battery

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28 pointsthunderbong63 comments

Makes me angry to see Apple bragging about their green credentials when the products are destined to become e-waste faster than necessary due to inevitable battery degradation and intentionally difficult battery replacement.

(Even worse when it's a $3K+ laptop and not just a phone. With a keyboard as well as a battery that'll wear over time, neither designed to support repair/replacement. Not sure if the newer models are as bad, but M1 MBP keycaps wear terribly)

The biggest upgrade they could give to the iPhone right now is a method of replacing the battery that doesn't require dealing with applying heat and removing adhesives, let alone batteries being cryptographically paired to a phone.

But they want to sell entire $1000+ phone/$3000+ laptop upgrades, not replacement batteries.

What kind of battery are you imagining doesn't eventually degrade?

The point is that the battery is a consumable part. It should be easy to replace.

Not everyone lives near an Apple Store, and phones are so essential to people that they're not likely to be prepared to mail their phone off for service.

> Not everyone lives near an Apple Store

Sure but how many people:

  1) don't live near an Apple Store
  2) don't live near any AASP (like Best Buy)
  3) don't live near any one of the many 3rd party repair shops that do these replacement daily
  4) don't have the mechanical and technical skills do do the replacement themselves by ordering the parts (and possibly renting tools) from Apple
  5) and also have $1k+ to be spending on a new iPhone every time the battery degrades too much

Don't forget:

6) and are also unwilling to send their phone to Apple for repair

> 4) don't have the mechanical and technical skills do do the replacement themselves by ordering the parts (and possibly renting tools) from Apple

There's several YouTube videos explaining how ridiculous this process is (renting the 'proper tools' from Apple). It's another attempt by Apple to justify repair-resistant devices by claiming it requires massive cases of specialised tools to do even the most basic repairs. Which maybe it does, but only because the devices aren't designed to be repaired...

Apple hasn’t ever said you have to use their specialized tools for repair.

Laws were passed requiring Apple to make their specialized tools, and the instructions to use them, available to consumers… so they did. And now the same people are criticizing them for doing exactly what was asked.

When and if they make available cheap tools to perform battery repairs at home, the same cast of characters will come out of the woodwork saying that the Apple Monopoly is unfairly targeting iFixit’s low-cost self-service repair business.

It seems like the HN audience feels ripped off by the $500 they paid for Mac Pro wheels, and plan to get their money’s worth by installing them on the goal posts instead.

You don't have to rent the tools from Apple. Apple will happily sell you just the battery and rent or sell as many or as few of the tools as you like. If you want to use the tools the professionals are going to use, you have that option. If you want to "shade tree mechanic" it, you're welcome to buy just the parts and follow their teardown process with your own tools, or follow someone like iFixit's teardown process with your tools and Apple's battery. And there's nothing wrong with doing it with "non-professional" tools. DIY car enthusiasts have been working with make shift alternatives to professional multi thousand dollar tools forever. Surely the DIY tech enthusiast isn't above the equivalent of tensioning your alternator with a 2x4 right?

I think the point was the difficulty and expense of replacement, not that the battery degrades.

The OP didn't imagine non-degradable batteries, just easily replaceable ones.

The batteries are now designed to be replaced. See iFixit’s teardown of recent devices.

> designed to be replaced

With which effort?

> See iFixit’s teardown of recent devices

Care to provide a link?

It's all rumors, iFixit hasn't released guides to the iphone 16 yet, not even a teardown AFAIK.

    Repair guides, disassembly, and troubleshooting information for the iPhone 16 Pro, released September 20th, 2024.

https://www.ifixit.com/Device/iPhone_16

I did swap an iPhone 8 battery not so long ago, really just to see how bad it was and whether I'd risk it on a newer device (which I didn't do in the end, after reading about 'non genuine battery' warnings on newer devices)

And while that replacement was a success, it was a ridiculous amount of effort for a battery change, involving special tools, heat, an unreasonable amount of disassembly, scraping adhesive off, the 'stretch to release' battery adhesive being utterly useless, so having to risk applying force to a potentially fiery battery, and so on.

Yes, iFixit are doing great work, and it's certainly possibly for a hobbyist-level 'tinkerer' to successfully change the battery. But it shouldn't be close to that difficult. I remember it being a fairly trivial job in the iPhone 5 era.

More modern iPhones (14 onward and 15pro onward) are a lot easier to replace the battery. No need to remove the screen anymore, it can all be done from the back side. Apparently the pull tabs for the batteries are a lot better, as well.

Still requires heat, but I’m not sure I’d call a little heat and some pry tools particularly “special” tools.

It’s a compromise being made to achieve better rigidity and waterproofing. Seems like a reasonable trade off, honestly, for something that needs to be changed maybe every few years.

Obligatory mention of the waterproof Galaxy S5, with its quickly-swappable battery by popping the back off.

If you are willing to trade heat and pry tools for thinness, that's a legitimate opinion, but please don't blame the trade-off on waterproofing.

The S5 is rated for IP67, 1 meter for 30 mins.

The S7 (S6 for some reason didn’t get an IP rating?) got an IP68, 1.5m for 30 mins.

Samsung seems to have stalled at 1.5m/30mins.

iPhones on the other hand have steadily crept up their listed ratings for water resistance: 8: IP67 1m/30m 11: IP68 2m/30m 12: 68 6m/30m

Seems that you’re actually getting some advantage. 1 meter isn’t really good enough for dropping in, say, a pool or a lake. 6 meters on the other hand… should cover most scenarios.

> Seems that you’re actually getting some advantage.

Seems like a vanishingly small fraction of users are getting some advantage. Everyone else just pays.

Literally the same argument could be made for easy user replaceable batteries.

A vanishingly small fraction of users take advantage of replacing their battery and instead just pass it along either in trade in, or in passing down to a family member/friend. This wasn’t any different when batteries were easily user replaceable.

You’re optimizing for an event that happens every few years instead of optimizing for something that is felt every single day (form factor, ergonomics, etc).

What do you think is much more common, people swimming deep with (or drowning, or otherwise submerging - deep enough so higher ratings start to matter aka not just phone falling in a sink) their phones, or people looking to replace a battery after it naturally degrades?

I've swam with my phone exactly zero times. Haven't dropped it in any deep water. But I have a bunch of devices with batteries barely holding any charge. And I suspect it's the most common situation.

I'm old enough to still have a (working) 2004 PowerBook which lets you change batteries as easily as with a flashlight. No tools. Bonus: You can switch batteries on the fly and the computer stays on a while so you don't have to mess around shutting down and restarting. That's one heavy machine.

>But they want to sell entire $1000+ phone upgrades, not replacement batteries.

A comment like this is on every iPhone story and once again I have to ask, who the heck is willing to keep their phone if they can buy a $30 replacement battery on Amazon, but also would rather pay $1000+ for a replacement phone instead of buying a $120 battery replacement from Apple or less at any number of 3rd party mall vendors?

And how many of these people are there that the income they generate from buying a new phone every 2 years that they could have otherwise replaced the battery in if only there were $30 amazon replacements is enough for Apple to be purposefully with no other reason assembling the phones the way they do?

> who the heck is willing to keep their phone if they can buy a $30 replacement battery on Amazon

How about reusing an iPhone by someone else?

Ok, so who the heck is willing to re-use someone else's phone and would do so if they could replace it with a $30 part from Amazon, but because they need to take it to Apple or some other retailer and pay up to $120 to have it replaced for them, would rather drop $1k on a new phone?

At some point in the depreciation curve of the iPhone, it will not make sense for certain types of users (students?) to pay $120 for Apple to replace the battery, since $30 battery is not available, and instead would make more sense to buy a newer used iPhone. The price sensitive user themselves would not drop $1k on a new phone, but someone else in the upgrade treadmill will.

I really doubt any significant number of people would be buying $1k phones repeatedly if the cost wasn't amortized like they are. People don't feel like they're preserving a luxury item that costs that much, they feel like they're preserving something for the price of $120 that costs 1000/24 or whatever. When I go and actually spend $600 straight up for my non-iPhone (more than I'd prefer for the value it offers me) it hurts, and I'm going to do what I can within reason to keep it running.

Sure, at a certain point in every product's lifespan there's a certain point where it doesn't make sense for certain buyers of used products to pay higher prices for replacement parts if lower prices were available. But the claim made was: "the products are destined to become e-waste faster than necessary due to inevitable battery degradation and intentionally difficult battery replacement."

So in order for iPhones to "become e-waste faster than necessary" and also for Apple to be doing this "[because] they want to sell entire $1000+ phone/$3000+ laptop upgrades, not replacement batteries", is the assertion that the market for users who would buy a used iPhone, for which it is not economical for them to spend $90 more on a battery replacement are generating enough extra disposal of used iPhones that Apple has intentionally chosen this design in order to maximize the sale of new phones to people that are selling their phones to this contingent of buyers?

Is there even any evidence to suggest that the number of used iPhones that would otherwise be sold to someone for whom a $30 battery replacement is economical, but not a $120 replacement is significantly routed instead to the trash instead of being sold to other users who are not as price sensitive? Even just a study of the average used market lifespan of iPhones compared to other cell phones might be instructive here.

The charge definitely has an impact on the market lifespan of the phone. It makes an older phone less attractive.

Let's do a thought experiment: The cost of an iPhone 16 is $800 brand new in 2024. The year is now 2028 and someone is giving a student the phone for free (and they need a phone), but warn that the battery is glitchy and worn out. Let's say there is no third party replacement. At what price will the student accept the phone and replace the battery? At what price would the student just get a brand new iPhone 20 at $800? Assume the following replacement charges: $700/$480/$240/$120.

Yes, the price is relevant compared to the price of a new phone. And for what it's worth, the $120 price point only applies to the pro models, so your entry price is $900. But that aside, again I ask who are these people that are forgoing a $120 battery for a phone (one they'd be perfectly happy with if they could get a $30 replacement battery) in favor of a new $800 phone instead?

Yes in a hypothetical world where Apple charges $700 for a new battery, and a brand new iPhone can be had for $800, it's reasonable to think a good chunk of phones with degraded batteries would be discarded in favor of new phones. Likewise if we imagined a hypothetical world where iPhones randomly explode, killing the owner but only after it has been sold second hand, we'd also see a decline in the lifespan of used iPhones. But we don't live in such a world, and the batter replacement cost is not $700, or $480, or $240. It's $120 for two models and $99 for most others. And this $120 battery replacement world is the world the original commenter suggests that iPhones are becoming e-waste at a rate much more rapidly than they otherwise would if only they had $30 amazon replacements and sliding battery doors. It's the world where the original commenter implies that the only (or at least a significant) reason Apple designs the iPhone batteries the way they do is to drive sales of $1k+ phones. So in this world, who are the people rejecting $120 battery replacements for $1k+ phones?

I don't understand your comment - are you saying that there should be no difference in behavior between a $30 expense and a $120 expense? Maybe for you there's no distinction, but population effects on behavior always occur in the margins, and there's a considerable difference between $30 and $120 for a lot of people.

Otherwise why not make it $200 or $300 for a battery replacement? Why is $120 just perfect?

> are you saying that there should be no difference in behavior between a $30 expense and a $120 expense?

I'm saying the number of people who:

  1) Would buy a used iPhone
  2) Would buy said iPhone so late in its depreciation cycle that the difference between a $30 and a $120 expense is the difference between buying and not buying the device
  3) Are unwilling to entertain any other form of battery replacement for such an old phone (like 3rd party vendors who will replace it for say $70)
  4) Are the buyers of last resort for the given iPhone and because they didn't buy it the phone has gone instead to the landfill because no one else would buy it except for them

is so vanishingly small a quantity of people, that they have no measurable impact on the speed which with iPhones become e-waste relative to a world where iPhones had batteries easily replaced with a $30 amazon purchase, and also have no measurable impact on the rate of new iPhone purchases such that it would even be a factor in how Apple chooses to design or not design any given iPhone model.

> that the difference between a $30 and a $120 expense is the difference between buying and not buying the device

Why does it matter? It doesn't have to be the difference between buying and not buying. It just could help students to save money.

It matters because the original claims I was responding to was that Apples iPhone battery designs are accelerating their path to e-waste relative to a world where these cheaper easily replaced batteries were available and that the (or at least a significant) reason Apple chooses this design is to sell more $1k+ new phones instead of selling batteries. For these claims to be true, there must be a significant enough fraction of people who either replace their phone with $1k+ new phones when their old battery dies because for some reason spending $120 on a battery replacement is too much or a significant number of people who would buy/use them second hand, but refuse to because $120 for a battery replacement (or any of the available cheaper options) is too much. And such a significant number that they are actively moving the needle on the number of new iPhones sold and the speed at which otherwise wanted iPhones are being sent to the trash.

> For these claims to be true, there must be a significant enough fraction of people

No. For this effect to be significant, there must be a significant enough fraction of such people. For this effect to exist, there must exist any fraction of such people.

If the effect exists but has no net impact, then that effect might as well not exist. It is meaningless and irrelevant to a discussion on whether a given design is good or bad or what its intentions are.

Let's say that one such person exists, and they personally have caused 5 iPhones over their lifetime to go to the trash pile earlier than they would have if the design was different. In the mean time, in a parallel world, we have different design. And in this other world, 6 iPhones over the same time period go into the trash earlier than they otherwise would have because of faulty water ingress protection where the battery contacts penetrate the shell, or because of a broken battery contact, or because someone put a cheap 3rd party replacement in that caught fire. When we compare the two worlds side by side, we discover then that the "replaceable battery" world is one where the iPhone battery design is the one that drives iPhones to become e-waste faster and drives the sale of more $1k phones.

Since we can't have two parallel worlds, the best we can do is compare the iPhone to other phones and/or look at the size of the effect and whether it's significant enough to show up in design planning. If it does not generate a significant effect on the market, then claiming the effect of this minuscule fraction of people makes iPhones "destined to become e-waste faster than necessary" or that they factor into the design decision because apple wants "to sell entire $1000+ phone/$3000+ laptop upgrades, not replacement batteries." is fallacious. It's fallacious in the same way that claiming that butterflies flapping their wings in Beijing are causing more iPhones to become e-waste sooner than necessary because they contribute to hurricanes and many phones are damaged or lost in such storms. Butterflies might indeed create a very real effect on air currents when they flap their wings. But I'm not about to start an advocacy program for slaughtering butterflies to keep iPhones from becoming e-waste in a hurricane without some evidence that the effect is significant. And no one would accept the claim that butterflies cause iPhones to become e-waster sooner than necessary as true because the effect butterflies have exists, no matter how insignificant it is.

It's not always just battery replacement:

Spend 12% of the cost of a new phone to keep the deficient one running, spend even bigger fraction on both battery and another overpriced fix to have decent QoL on the used phone (or other way around, fix a broken screen to have a working old phone with bad battery or spend bigger part of the price of a new phone to fix both), expecting the new battery to die sooner, requiring another 12% as well as other overpriced fixes due to the phone's age -- or just buy a new phone and impress whomever you want without any hassle and worry?

I don't think that's majority of cases, but I bet it's a significant amount (>5%), in a large market

And if neither fixes nor selling deficient phone aren't expected to yield decent profit on used phone market, many won't hassle with it.

The other thing is that who would be willing to trade off safety on some mystery meat $30 Amazon battery or similarly questionable battery one would get by getting a repair at a suspiciously cheap shop. Not that $120 is a great price exactly, but assurance that the thing won't become dangerous is surely worth a few tens of dollars.

Doesn’t the vibrant market in second-hand iPhones suggest that they tend to not become e-waste particularly quickly? The phones tend to get software for much longer than most.

One can pay for a battery replacement, or sell/trade-in a device. Selling may lead to the battery being replaced by someone more willing to do it, or to other refurbishment.

This phenomenon is predicated upon a hierarchical economic class system, which it also reinforces. Therefore it is not a morally sustainable system, and is just another case of greenwashing.

I agree it’s not moral but it seems like it’s been pretty sustainable so far. As in, we’ve had a hierarchical class system for millennia and it doesn’t look to be going anywhere that soon. So I don’t think it’s fair to say that that(‘s what) makes it greenwashing.

Are you saying it would be better if there weren’t a second-hand market? I’m not sure I really understand why that would be better. Maybe there’s a story one could tell for how someone’s situation would be better in such a world?

I'm just saying that Apple doesn't get to point to a second-hand market to greenwash their products. I do agree that their phones potentially enjoy a longer average lifespan than the average Android, especially with extended security updates.

I think I’m more confused by the claim that my statement above is ‘predicated on a hierarchical economic class system’. I don’t particularly want to argue about whether you or I live under a class system that is particularly hierarchical or economic, so let’s just suppose that we do. Why would my claim above (not sure whether you mean that vibrant 2nd hand market => less e-waste, or that selling a device where the battery hasn’t been replaced could lead to the buyer paying for a battery replacement and potentially reselling) not apply without such a hierarchical economic class system?

Maybe I misunderstood what ‘predicated’ meant?

It frustrates me as well, especially when people brag about how “green” their devices are, despite the fact that they’ve went through 3 phones in almost as many years. If we wanted truly green devices we would create standardized parts that can easily be swapped out like we did for computers. The Fairphone is an excellent example of this, actually.

Another great example is Pinephone.

I'd wager out of all the phones in each category sold more Pinephones as a percentage of total sold have become e-waste faster than any model iPhone. Maybe the first couple generation iPhones might have had a faster turn around just on sheer YoY model improvements.

Why is that? Unlike all iPhones, Pinephone will never stop receiving updates and can be used as a full desktop with mainline Linux, even if the cellular network has problems.

Because I'd also bet the vast majority of Pinephones sold have been sold as secondary phones to hobbyists and tinkers. And I suspect a good chunk of those have gone into drawer or are otherwise collecting dust unused after the initial cool factor wore off. Don't get me wrong, I like what pine64 does, and they're great to have around overall, but I also strongly doubt the long term viability of their phones both as a primary phone for daily use and in terms of a secondary market.

I daily drive a Pinephone Pro as my only smartphone. I adore it, but I think you're right about the precentage that ended up in a drawer.

I'd still say it's worth it overall though: the low price pushed it into many more developers hands than could afford the Librem 5. More developers (and users for bug reports or community support) means more viable software for all Linux-mobile devices - which has resulted in people being able to hang on to other devices for longer! Notably, the Pixel 3a is currently making headway to be useable under Mobian, but this also applies to other devices that I haven't followed as closely, such as the Pixel 4a, the Oneplus 6, and so on.

Their most recent phone (made in 2022) uses an SoC introduced in 2016.

By any reasonable comparison it was an outdated phone when it was released. 2 years of age haven’t done it well. At some point, no matter how repairable/replaceable the other components are, the computer is just not powerful enough to be useful.

> By any reasonable comparison it was an outdated phone when it was released

https://puri.sm/posts/the-danger-of-focusing-on-specs/

I reject this characterization from a quite frankly biased party. They’re selling hardware here themselves, and attempting to justify selling old hardware.

Modern hardware is quite good, but it inevitably succumbs to compute creep needs over time.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intentional_Fallacy. You can't find counter-arguments, so you attack the speaker.

They are right that the hardware will be useful for a very long time. We have a lot of examples how people use very old laptops for their tasks.

Compute creep is a joke. It’s only a problem because we allow incompetent programmers to abstract away their inability to code efficiently.

As a confirmation, SXMo works flawlessly on Pinephone without any lags.

they eu should offer them a choice: replace batteries past a limit for free, or offer the sort of phone where you can replace the battery by removing a few screws.

> replace batteries past a limit for free, or offer the sort of phone where you can replace the battery by removing a few screws

Given the number that will get ruined from water exposure, it might make them money!

Samsung has proved you wrong for years.

> Samsung has proved you wrong for years

In comparison with Samsung phones, “Apple’s iPhones on average have an additional year of use even though the two brands are comparable in quality and technological innovation” [1].

[1] https://environment.yale.edu/news/article/when-it-comes-to-s...

that's a very surprising statement. I've owned waterproof phones with screws, the only reason I had to stop using them was that the manufacturers violated GPL and did not release the drivers/kernel source.

I've regularly washed mud off them without any issues. there is such a thing as a waterproof rubber ring.

I have to agree with the other comments here. 120$ vs. 1000$+ for a new phone, I don’t see how it can compare. I still agree it’s overpriced though.

Until 2028, when the new EU regulation on replaceable batteries comes into force.

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