Apple has announced that it's offering $29 iPhone battery replacements for iPhone 6 and newer models, but what about the older iPhones that still get throttled? iFixit has a solution for it.
For those unfamiliar with the whole matter, Apple is in the middle of a PR nightmare after admitting that it has been intentionally slowing down iPhones. The company said it's been deliberately throttling older iPhone models to extend their battery life and prevent random shutdowns, but not force users' hand to upgrade to a newer model because their old one is no longer working properly.
Apple Offers $29 iPhone Battery Replacements
After sparking a huge controversy and more than a dozen lawsuits with its confession, Apple has dropped the price of an iPhone battery from $79 to $29. The $50 discount is its way to make things right and make up for its lack of transparency.
As several lawsuits alleged, if people knew about this deliberate iPhone slowdown to protect aging batteries, they might have preferred to get a battery replacement, even at full price, rather than get a new iPhone altogether.
Even now, Apple has shaved $50 off the price of an iPhone battery replacement, but only for iPhone 6 and newer models, although it's been throttling older iterations as well. Those with an iPhone 5s or other older iPhone model are left out of this deal and should pay the full $79 if they want to replace their handset's battery and have it working well again.
iFixit To The Rescue
Apple might think this is fair, but popular repair shop iFixit thinks it's not, so it stepped up and came up with a solution to help those with older iPhones, too. More specifically, iFixit announced that it will match Apple's $29 price point and sell DIY iPhone battery repair kits at the same price, and it's not limiting the offer only to iPhone 6 or newer models.
The third-party repair shop is offering replacement kits for the older iPhone 4s, iPhone 5, iPhone 5s, and iPhone 5c, none of which are included in Apple's program, but are nonetheless throttled to preserve battery life.
The main difference compared to Apple's program, however, is that with iFixit's DIY iPhone battery repair kit, customers will have to replace the handset's battery themselves. It might sound complicated, but iFixit mails the kits with all necessary tools and instructions so that even inexperienced users can do the swap without much hassle.
