Can Modern Smartphones Be Repaired and To What Extent? This Study Says It All

New research is shedding light on modern smartphone designs and their ability to be repaired.

Before modern smartphones came into existence, many manufacturers allowed owners to replace batteries by themselves. But as days go by, the designs and interfaces of smartphones are getting more complex, thanks for business monopolies and planned obsolescence.

This is why tech giants such as Apple are going out of their to explain to users that you can no longer repair your device alone at home safely. It requires experts to analyze the situation and offer replacements when a switch is needed. Other than tools, a lot of repairs need third-party tools to get the job done right.

As per one device repairing platform, iFixit, modern devices make use of specific materials like strong glue and screws. This is why tech giants Apple and Samsung rank pretty low in terms of the repairability factor. Shockingly, iFixit experts in their index gave Pixel 8 and 8 Pro scores of six out of 10.

The score comes after looking at several factors. For instance, how readily available documents are for a repair and if any parts are needed that cannot be found easily. Is the battery glued in areas that can be reached easily? Do you need an expert’s help to unscrew the device to access a certain site on the device?

There are a lot of questions to answer and based on how well a device answers them, the better their ranking on repairability indexes. You’ll be amazed to learn how the Samsung Galaxy device received just a score of four out of 10. But it was praised for using normal screws from Phillips.

When you take a look at iPhone devices, they also got a low score of just four out of 10. Still, iFixit says the latest range of iOS phones ranks high in terms of easy battery replacements. The same goes for the screen that can be replaced swiftly.

In terms of spare parts, Apple loses out. The pairing of parts is complex with iPhones as each part is paired against a digital serial number. Hence, you can’t land up at any repair shop but a specific software one to get the job done. This means repairability gets more challenging.

Repairability Ratings for Smartphones (10=highest)

The score factors in 10% for the service manual, 10% for replacement parts, and 80% for the ease and time required to replace the most critical components.

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