This year, Apple is receiving a surprising amount of praise for the repairability of its new iPhones: the company received at least 7 out of 10 points in the “Repairability Score” from the repair portal iFixIt. This applied to both the iPhone 16 and the iPhone 16 Pro. Only the standard models offer a special feature: their battery sits in the housing with a special adhesive that can be removed by applying voltage. According to a leaker, Apple is now planning to expand the iPhone 17 technology to all devices.
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Four adhesive elements leaked
Corresponding components should already be in pre-production: A picture on X shows the total four of the adhesive elementswhich according to @MajinBuOfficial should be intended for the four 2025 iPhones. In a blog entry he goes on to write that Apple is now using the technology for all four models of the iPhone 17 plan. The leaker correctly predicted the new titanium special color “desert sand” for the iPhone 16 Pro and 16 Pro Max, but was also wrong in the past.
Even with the adhesive elements of the iPhone 17, it should be sufficient to apply a low electrical voltage to loosen the adhesive – “without any effort”. In fact, the battery then practically falls to the repairman, which is a relief after many years of hard gluing and the use of pull tabs that have to be removed with great effort.
Can the iPhone 17 Air also be repaired?
The iPhone 17 will probably be released in September 2025. Apple is reportedly planning four variants again, with an “iPhone 17 Air” with a particularly thin housing instead of the iPhone 17 Plus. The fact that this can also be repaired comparatively easily would be commendable.
iFixIt now also has suitable hardware ready to release batteries with a conventional USB-C power supply – but otherwise a 9-volt block battery with crocodile clips is sufficient. Of course, little has changed in the still lengthy opening process of the iPhone, but at least Apple now provides this detailed repair instructions out, this year even very close to the release of the iPhone 16. Of course, Apple also has a battery solution own instructions on his website ready.
(bsc)