While this is a good step forward, it feels like complaining about the 0.025% of plastic from straws in the ocean while ignoring the 75% of plastic from fishing nets.
I own a 2020 Kona EV. The battery cannot be upgraded. Eventually, I'll have to replace the entire car to get a longer range. BEVs should be mandated to have upgradable batteries and modular interfaces so that the shell can continue to be reused, the batteries (and BMS) upgraded, and old batteries easily recycled.
Useful life of most of the cars is on par with their battery longevity, as long as you have proper thermal management and your usage patterns are not outliers.
Focusing on being able to upgrade battery (and to be clear - upgrade, not replaced/repair) is solving 1% problem.
Yes, which is why they are replacable, and Hyundai is bound by law to keep making batteries for OP's Kona for a good while even after the production stops.
I don't see how that's even remotely comparable. It's not like you can replace the battery in your phone with a larger one. You will be able to buy a new battery for your car, that's already guaranteed in the EU - but it will be the same capacity as what you got.
I don't know why is this even an argument really, like.....in a petrol car, do you expect to be able to fit it with a bigger fuel tank after 10 years? or a more powerful engine? Until very recently even software updates to the infotainment weren't really a thing, if you wanted a newer interface you had to change the entire car(I'm not saying this was a good thing, just that generally the expectation is that the product will work the way it was when you bought it).
Disagree. I want a replaceable battery in my phone. They can get to extensible memory next. And it's not because you don't care about something that you should remove this freedom from me. And don't tell me that the market will self regulate in the best interests of the consumer or other nonsense like that.
I was looking forward to finally be able to easily switch out (i)Phone batteries again - after 20 years - but turns out the lobbyists managed to get a loophole in the law - exempting Apple & Co from making their phones more repairable / longer live-able.
> If a battery can do 1000 cycles and remain above 80% capacity it is exempt
The exemption is about ensuring customers get what they paid for. It shouldn’t care how the manufacturer achieves that; driving the batteries less hard is an obvious tactic, and actually also makes them safer to use.
Seems entirely reasonable. Embedded batteries have a lot of advantages. Cheaper, higher battery capacity, water proof, smaller, stronger. I think this will largely just make the mid to low tier android market in the EU shittier.
Citation needed. It seems pretty clear that a mechanism to allow a user to access a battery will increase complexity, making all the other properties harder to achieve.
Yes, this is the most non-story I have ever seen on this topic. I do not know of any manufacturer who does not claim this, verifiable or otherwise; and even if they can't claim it, all they have to do is one minor purely-software capacity adjustment, which they will gladly do before they will even consider offering removable batteries.
Apple has no chance to claim their batteries can have 80% capacity after 1000 cycles seeing how they never achieved this so far. Lying about it puts them in a world of mass recalls and fraud investigations.
Depends on how "cycle" is defined - I'm sure they can finagle it so "any charge added to the battery" counts as a cycle.
As a datapoint my iPhone reports 522 cycles and 89% max - from march 2024. I do use the "limit charging to 80%" feature which I suspect may become mandatory before 2027 ...
No shot at all apple batteries can last 1000 cycles and remain above 80% capacity. Probably can’t even do 300 in my experience. Sounds like an easy lawsuit.
No doubt they will redefine maximum battery capacity to a figure that does achieve 80% over 1000 cycles. If you under-declare maximum capacity then there is a lot of headroom for actual degradation before you start to show degradation to the user.
This is what they should have been doing all along. My Pixel tells me that charging above 80% is bad for battery longevity and I should set a charge limit. Well then maybe 80% should be the new 100% and the advertised capacity should be the 80%.
They can use a large battery and software lock the capacity to 50% but that would be very wasteful and expensive for them, and make for a very chonky phone.
Or they can use a normal battery, label it with a lower capacity and actually allow you to use all of it but that would be lying and probably very illegal especially when it comes to mislabeling batteries.
A battery that can support 1000 cycles and remain above 80% capacity would be a literal brick. For an example the Vision Pro's battery has extreme over-provisioning and limit how long it would last. (note I know it is removable but that isn't the point).
That has not been my experience, at least with Apple laptops. Even when rated for 1000 cycles, I'll get the warning that service is needed (AFAIK that means 80% capacity or lower) well before then. I've seen this on several, but the one I just checked is at just under 670 cycles and has had that warning up for some months already.
Maybe iPhones are better about this, though, I don't know. But I definitely don't have a lot of faith in the laptops maintaining 80% for 1000 cycles.
>The regulation states that batteries must be removable using ‘commercially available’ tools
This is doing a lot of work here. There's enough wiggle room for this to be absolutely meaningless. Anything short of I can slide off the back cover and maybe unscrew two or three screws to replace the battery means that a lot of people are going to end up not being able to replace the batteries.
The rest of that same sentence, " – and that if specialised tools are required, they must be provided free of charge when the phone or tablet is purchased," seems to mitigate that concern, no? I suppose it hinges on what the test for a "specialized tool" is.
EU regulatory bodies haven’t been as blindly sycophantic towards megacorporations in terms of allowing them to skirt by rules set forth by their legislatures, so I would be more optimistic than if this were a development in US law.
Specialised as in created specifically for swapping battery of that specific phone? As in you cannot do it with a generic commercially available tool (e.g. a screwdriver)
Article 11 of Regulation (EU) 2023/1542 states that a battery shall be considered readily removable by the end-user where it can be removed from a product with the use of commercially available tools, without requiring the use of specialised tools, unless provided free of charge with the product, proprietary tools, thermal energy, or solvents to disassemble the product.
Guidance on tool types can be drawn from standard EN 45554:2020e (2). In the context of the assessment of a product’s ability to be repaired, reused and upgraded, this standard uses the following classification groups: (i) basic tools (including
those provided with the product as a spare part) or no tools; (ii) product-group specific tools; (iii) commercially available
tools; and (iv) proprietary tools.
The concept of commercially available tools mentioned in Article 11 comprises the categories of basic tools or no tools and of commercially available tools as per EN 45554:2020e.
The concept of specialised tools laid down in the Regulation refers to product-group specific tools that are not available for purchase by the general public but are not protected by patents either. Article 11 requires that any such specialised tool that
might be necessary to have a portable battery removed and replaced is provided free of charge with the product into which the battery is incorporated.
As per EN 45554:2020e, proprietary tools refer to tools not available for purchase by the general public, or for which any applicable patent are not available for license under fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory terms. Such tools should not be
needed to remove portable batteries
--- start quote ---
(I fully expect literally no one on HN to spend even a second looking for and reading the relevant texts, and complain about the law being vague or impossible to implement or something)
Maybe. Maybe not. If my local phone and phone accessories shop can do it for little money in 15 minutes then the current calculus changes for a heck of a lot of people.
No. I can't find a legit battery for my Samsung phone, only forgeries and "compatible with"s. Local repair shop said they could put a new OEM battery into this 4yo second-hand phone
So I pay them and they do it. The result:
- back cover becomes rather loose while it's warm e.g. from fast charging or a hot day out. No longer waterproof
- the battery is no better than the original and is (2y later now) degrading faster than the original. If you ask a lot of it, the last 35% are gone within minutes. I think it's a knock-off battery but that the repair person doesn't know that
If there had been commercially available repair parts and tool access, neither would have been a problem and I could just have done it myself
My mom has the same model and sent hers in to the manufacturer for a battery swap. Took a while and cost half the price of the phone (since it was a 2yo second-hand at that time). That could have been much faster, even if the manufacturer is free to set the same steep prices
A colleague got their phone back from Google for some repair last week, I don't remember if screen or battery swap. He asked and they said it wouldn't be reset. He put a sticker on it not to wipe the device. They wiped the device. He's now trying to piece together what's in various backup files that Android allows making. Fun fun fun. Also not necessary if you, or your techy nephew, can just do it at home
---
The requirement for commercially availability of repair is so much better than the current state of what repair places can/are offering
I think the supply chain is pretty broken. I had just about the same experience as you with an iPhone 7 a few years back. I booked my replacement through Apple's website, so I was pretty confident I wouldn't get scammed. The new battery started bulging in less than two years, to the point that there was a serious gap between the screen and the body.
It was clearly worse than the battery that came with my refurbished (!) phone, which never did that; it just couldn't hold a decent charge anymore. I won't even go into the absolutely ridiculous experience I had with the repair shop, like not honoring booked times and whatnot and having me wait in line for ages, both to drop off and pick up my phone.
My current phone has lost some of its battery health as reported by the OS, but still gives me over a day of use, but when the time comes to fix it, I'll go directly to Apple.
Same with laptops btw. I once caught a seller where the store and sticker said 5200 mAh but acpi -i reported 4400 mAh. They provided a replacement free of charge, presumably their supplier scammed them in turn (it was a small local webshop), but that also wasn't great even if now the chip reported the expected capacity. Never once have I had good experiences with replacement batteries, I really wonder what they do with the originals to make them so vastly superior
Also quite noticeable that the laptop battery market became much smaller once the batteries became an internal component (around 2015) that you can't see without opening it up completely. These also used to be a slider or two
People don't dare unscrew electronics, even if it's about as trivial as replacing a light bulb in a fixture that requires removing a screw. With phones having the battery inside as well now, not above the sim tray anymore for example, I wonder how much such legislation is going to help the average person
Last time I checked I’d have to leave my phone for a couple of days and the glue factor meant they wouldn’t guarantee it would come back perfectly. My assumption is this might make it a more trivial change.
There were models that were both waterproof and not glued (the only tools needed for a battery swap were the replacement battery and opposable thumbs). I never had/tested one myself though, this is just going off of the manufacturer's claims and IP (ingress protection) certification
I used to have a Galaxy S5, the model that usually comes up in these discussions. Now, I never went and threw it in a swimming pool, or pressure washed it, or whatever other ridiculous test you may come up with. But I did attach it to my motorbike's handlebars and rode around under heavy rain on more occasions than I care to remember.
It was often drenched to the point that the map on the screen was basically illegible without stopping and wiping off the water. But it never skipped a beat. Basically, I was the limiting factor and would eventually give up and find some hotel with a hot shower to pass the night.
My last phone was all glued and the entry point was the screen. The repair guy said there was a 50% chance the screen would break in trying to unglue it so it was not worth the try. It was a shame, it was a decent phone killed prematurely by a faulty battery.
There are a number of phone designs that require special heating apparatus and very careful prying tools to get the back case off. And then extremely careful application of new glue to reassemble. Basically the whole thing is glued together at the factory. Google "phone heating pad for repair" for some examples...
That reads true. While replaceability is definitely a good thing, but whether it will end up being a good thing for the average user (and not lead to some further price hikes in the EU market) remains to be seen.
Aren't today's phone batteries already replaceable with commercially available tools? I can walk into a store with my iPhone and walk out with a replaced battery 20 minutes later.
This isn't even what drives obsolesce of phones, it's software updates.
If you really want to be able to self-swap your own battery, you can just buy an Android that has a replaceable battery.
Do we need to regulate something that isn't a problem? All regulation has downsides, is it worth paying this price here?
In a perfect world, sure. But people also want phones these days that are physically durable, have some degree of waterproofing/water resistance, maximum battery life, etc. Many of the demands and expectations of a modern phone aren't easily compatible with a replaceable battery design that can withstand the incompetence of the average end user.
Engage with the content of his comment instead of resorting to ad hominem.
He's right - the market wants embedded batteries, although perhaps not directly. Embedded batteries have improved price, battery capacity, water proofing, size, and strength. If the consumer really wanted a removable battery and all that that entails then there would be more phones that offered that. The reality is people misjudge what all that entails. By all means, I would love to just make the iPhone battery directly replaceable without any compromises but that's not reality.
I originally did engage with the comment. Water-resistance absolutely is still possible if the replacement battery is waterproof. Water can over time be corrosive at the contacts, but that's a risk for the user. It does not in any way imply that water will enter the internals of the device from the point of contact with the battery. The other argument of size is nonsense because adding 2 mm of thickness is less important than providing five years of extra life.
It's likely impossible to legislate but it would be nice to say "each generation has to have one user-replaceable battery". Everyone who doesn't care (the 99%) can buy the iPhone 19x, and the people who want replaceable batteries can get the iPhone B.
Why do you imply that the phone could no longer be waterproof? Granted, it would take a bit of extra engineering to make it comparably waterproof. There is no reasonable implication that water would leak into the internals of the device where it makes contact with the battery.
How do you feel about the batteries in electric vehicles?
What about wearable devices like a smartwatch, headphones, smart glasses?
Should all these be consumer-replaceable without tools, regardless of the effect on the other things people value in these devices (waterproofing, size and weight, battery life, etc.)?
FYI I do not work for anything close to the consumer tech industry.
I was wondering about that. I lost my iPhone 13 mini the other day, did the find my phone beep thing and got a distant beep from my washing machine which was on wash cycle.
Surprisingly the phone was fine and works fine after a brief rinse under the tap. It must be hard to combine that sort of water resistance with easy user changing.
Don't fall for the 'glue cuz of protection' myth - there are and had been water-resistant phones way before Apple started glueing to avoid customers doing their own repairs and them losing out on new sales.
Yes, but IP67 is not nearly as water resistant as IP68, which all modern phones are for the most part.
I'm not knowledgeable enough to know if IP68 could be achieved in a phone without glue. There's no clamping mechanism for the backs, they're just press-fit with small clips.
And what about if 4 years they says that they have dettected a problem in your battery? A new battery should fix that but now you cannot do it properly because it could do 1000 cycles.
This same thing happened to Pixels 6a after 500 cycles.
Then don’t buy a phone from a company with a piss poor record of customer service.
Just looking in maps, there are three Apple Stores within a 45 minute drive from where I live in central Florida.
The situation is worse in my hometown in South GA admittedly, you have to drive 70 miles for same day service for an authorized repair place - mostly Best Buy.
Isn't this pretty much what Nothing are doing? At least one of their phones has a different battery rating in India than elsewhere, despite containing the same hardware.
What if we regulate batteries even more? i.e. what if, in some magical perfect world, the world get's together and agrees on batteries for phones like how we agree on AA,AAA,D,C batteries? Even more though.. a standard connector, a standard comms bus, a variety of sizes, and they were designed for reuse as efficiently as possible.
Now we can scale up volume, swap them out, be free to purchase from a different manufacturer, and have scaled up recycling services.
Batteries have been used as part of planned obsolescence for too long and a whole small business industry of replacing phone batteries has appeared because of it. Next the EU are going to have to address security patches because its another aspect being used to sell new phones.
I have found out that the main phone providers (Apple, Google, Samsung) have extremely long support period. I really don't get the "planned obsolescence" thing.
As an example, in Jan 2026, Apple published iOS 12.5.8 which provides updates for iPhone 5s which released in Sept 2013. That's 12.5 years ago. The equivalent would be to connect to the internet using ADSL in Jan 2000 with your IBM PS/2 rocking in intel 8086, 512 kb of RAM and expecting an update for your DOS operating system.
>As an example, in Jan 2026, Apple published iOS 12.5.8 which provides updates for iPhone 5s which released in Sept 2013. That's 12.5 years ago. The equivalent would be to connect to the internet using ADSL in Jan 2000 with your IBM PS/2 rocking in intel 8086, 512 kb of RAM and expecting an update for your DOS operating system.
The updates for ios 12 are all security updates, not feature updates, so your comparison to "connect to the internet using ADSL in Jan 2000 with your IBM PS/2 rocking in intel 8086" doesn't really make sense. The phones stuck on ios 15 are basically unusable because many apps don't support it anymore. At best you can download an older version from a few years ago, but that depends on whether the backend servers were updated. Apps that insist you use the latest version (eg. banking/finance apps) basically unusable.
The EU already requires 5 years of patches since last year. Motorola thinks they have found a loophole, so there are still some, ahem, patches needed to the law.
> Batteries have been used as part of planned obsol[esc]ence for too long and a whole small business industry of replacing phone batteries has appeared because of it.
Note that early phones had replaceable batteries and it was later phones that dropped that feature. The idea wasn't that making the phone impossible to open would compel people to replace their phone faster; it was that given that people didn't keep their phones long enough to wear out the battery, there was no need to make the battery accessible.
also camera just not being satisfying enough anymore is a big deal
sure on highest end phones you have very good cameras since a long time by now, but even there they find improvements here and there (e.g. zoom, low light pictures, even better image stabilization)
but middle to lower end phones are still have major improvements in every generation of a certain brand/line/price category. And you might be satisfied with a "acceptable" quality camera, until everyone around you has way nicer photos, or you now have a reason to make photes you didn't had in the past, or you get older and your hands a bit unsteady etc.
Batteries are generally a cheap fix from third party stores. If you wanted to keep the phone why not spend the small dollars and just replace the battery?
Because you need to bring it to a shop, sometimes they may keep it for more times, sometimes if they are not that honest they will find something else and factory reset it and a long etc. If it's something one can do at home by one self as an expected and supported by the vendor operation, why not? You can still bring it to a store if you don't feel like crafty enough to do it.
Upgrade cycles have slowed down in recent years, the improvements are relatively incremental nowadays. Screens, durability, processors, storage sizes, cameras, even battery life are okay-ish and aren't improving quickly enough to justify the same upgrade rate. Foldables are basically the only big innovation in recent years, but are still a little too fragile and expensive.
This is also reflected in the increasing support durations from major manufacturers.
This might be partially true, but making them inacessible is still a great way approach to planned obsolescence and there's no way this was not part of the motivation. The fact that an entire industry exists to provide replacement batteries is proof of this, as is the fact that Apple offers a £100 battery replacement. They also replace the batteries of all refurbished models they sell, which again wouldn't be necessary if battery life wasn't a concern over the useful life of a phone.
Secondly, what you said may have been true in the past, when smartphones were rapidly evolving and upgrade cycles were short, but people are holding on to their devices for longer now, so its possible its becoming a problem again.
This was true back when Moore's law was the driver of obsolescence. You bought a new phone every year simply because next year's phone was twice as fast.
Now that this doesn't happen, the driver of obsolescence is the battery, which is much less defensible because you can swap it much more easily than "the whole internals of the phone".
Seems to me like the top goal should be: you can easily replace the most-likely-to-break parts (screen, back, battery, etc) in any local independent repair shop, with genuine parts that have low markups.
I'm confused why that still isn't the case today given all the EU headlines we've seen over the years.
I hate to say it, but the lack of removable batteries serves a purpose. It wasn't done just because 'screw consumers'.
It was done because:
* It makes phones massively easier to waterproof
* It allows for larger batteries
* It allows for more compact and lighter phones
Consumers, based on what they buy, have shown again and again that they want these features.
It also simplifies manufacture and lowers costs, which everyone likes.
I like removable batteries. If I had the option, I'd get a phone with that feature. But I know that I am certainly in the minority, as is almost everyone in this thread.
It's also worth pointing out that these days, battery and software have advanced to the point where degradation is quite slow in many cases. The phone will often outlive its useful life due to specs rather than battery.
They (Samsung, Apple, etc.) should never have been allowed to glue it behind the screen. Threaded fasteners and a silicone gasket cover is good enough for 99.999% of the public use-case.
Will this affect the water-resistance of current iPhones? I thought that was why the batteries are not easily replaceable by users, because of the seals/gaskets.
water resistance + easily battery exchange for repairs is very viable (AFIK always had been, too.)
like this law isn't about users causally replacing batteries like on very old phones
but about an repair shop easily and without risk of breaking your phone being able to replace it without only holding on your phone for idk. 10 minutes
So that you can just drop by (once they have the replacement parts) wait a moment and have a new battery.
This means in the worst case something like needing to a add a bit of additional seal/wax/glue or similar to improve sealing is very much fully viable (Id the sealing agent is generally buy able.)
It just is something you have to design in from the get to go. And it's easier to not do so at all. And maybe if you obsess if your phone is 1/10mm smaller or not that gets in your way too. And not doing so is more profitable as people will buy successor products more likely, even if just very slightly more likely.
But in general? That really isn't the problem.
Also even if it where the problem. What is better? Having a less waterproof phone, but not needing to buy a new one for another one or two years or having to buy one now?
There are multiple watches, cameras, etc., with a lot of physical buttons even, all with replaceable batteries and weather-resistant (or even better, water proof). This is a bad excuse.
Most wristwatches provide much stronger water resistance while still being very user serviceable with a $20 watch tool kit. Whatever the phone makers are peddling are mostly excuses.
While I'd be perfectly content with an IP67 iPhone with interchangeable battery, the current iPhones are IP68 which is a significant step up in dust/water ingress protection. IP68 devices generally require a sealant, IP67 normally doesn't, making it easier to do a battery hatch etc.
IP68 doesn't require a sealant if you just use enough pressure. Phones are just too thin to screw on the back plate and use a proper gasket. Which is stupid in the first place because most people then go and put a bulky cover on them.
How about computers to have replaceable SSDs? There's no point you can exchange the battery when the hard-soldered SSD dies first. (I had more dead SSDs than batteries)
Recently replaced the battery and charging port of my Fairphone. 5 screws, two plucked components, done. Hopefully this means that soon you won't have to buy a specific company's phone for this marvelous experience.
The Fairphone 5 is only IP55 rated (dust protected, and water droplet resistant). Most flagship phones are IP68 rated (fully dust sealed, and water submersible). IP68 phones are sealed with a single-use adhesive gasket, and replacing battery requires breaking (and replacing) this seal. If the seal is improperly applied, the phone is no longer protected from dust or water.
It seems like the whole world could massively benefit from this much like the other great innovation out of the EU -- the Common Charger Directive (aka USB-C).
> The move comes amid EU-wide efforts to cut the continent’s carbon footprint and tackle mounting waste [...]
...
> [...] if specialised tools are required, they must be provided free of charge when the phone or tablet is purchased.
So if a family buys several phones and tablets that all use the same specialized tool to change their batteries they end up with several identical specialized tools?
From a reducing waste perspective wouldn't it be better to just require that the tool be available for free for some reasonable amount of time such as however long the manufacturer is required to support the device?
Considering that this, and other, regulation is to officially aimed at reducing e-waste, the EU should commit to publish independent data on the amount of e-waste and phones replacement rates now and every year afterwards in order to measure the real world impact.
Too often, including in HN comments, those regulations ate presented as "obviously" good policies. Well, data are better than assumptions.
I don't know if this is standard, but at least for some previously enacted electronics regulations I know they look into the real-world effects. I think I was looking for information on how they calculate the battery life for the new smartphone energy labels (which videos should be played at what screen brightness; is the browsing test over WiFi or the LTE/NR modem; etc.) when I found some document about how much energy they're expecting to save with this regulation. It showed a base path of expected energy consumption development, and then how the regulation is expected to modify that
The shaded area is the effect that they think is attributable to regulations, e.g. -2.2TWh electricity per year in the category of phones and tablets when comparing 2010 and 2030
As another example, for "Servers and data storage products" they expect almost no change due to regulation: the consumption is expected to go from 48 to 67 TWh (2010 till 2030) and that it would have been 70 TWh without regulations. If I'm reading it right, this small improvement would be due to the 2019 "information requirement ... including the maximum allowed operating temperature for the equipment ... to stimulate data centres to choose equipment that supports higher operating temperatures, to enable further reduction of the cooling load."
Page 42 shows that they also take into account 'additional acquisition costs' (how much more expensive devices are because of this, I think that means?), but that this added expense is well below the energy costs that would have been incurred otherwise. Of course, that's what I'd say too about my regulations :) but I don't know of another information source for this so this is the best info I have atm
I am simply not a fan of this type of legislation. It reminds me of CA bullet button. I also don’t quite understand the purpose. Official retail cost from Apple in the US ~$120. Third-party you can usually get it around $60. Sure the battery does not have quick accessibility but I can replace it pretty cheaply.
Agreed. This rule will likely be irrelevant in 5-10 years when battery technology improves, and it has such a huge carve out (batteries that maintain 80% capacity after 1000 cycles are exempt) every phone manufacture can get around it. Phone makers can meet this regulation by artificially limiting battery capacity through software to protect battery health. Or they could put in a 10,000 mAh battery and only allow the user to use 8,000 of it, and use the rest as buffer.
A better example is the EU cookie consent law. The intent was to make websites stop using cookies, but what resulted was websites didn't change anything except put up annoying consent banners, and made the internet experience worse.
So this means no iPhone Air 2 in Europe? I can hardly see Apple wiggle around the special tools requirement when these batteries are glued and sealed shut in the devices.
[edit] didn’t see the fine print with the cycles requirement etc. so it seems Apple etc is still safe.
This is good. I recently had to replace a generally working phone because the battery was dying and there was no cost effective & reliable means of replacing.
A proper gasket and screws needs to be the standard solution here.
It probably makes things easier, but its unlikely that the industry that found a way to make foldables waterproof couldn't figure out a way to put rubber gaskets on battery covers. And in fact, they did, there were several devices introduced in the transition period that had both features.
Rubber gaskets wear out. Best practice is to replace them every time you open the cover. We can put them in, but the replacement battery better come with the gasket because you can't safely replace the battery without a new gasket.
Galaxy S5 was IP67-rated (1 metre depth, 30 minutes) and had a user-replaceable back cover / battery
Also a notification LED, OLED screen, bezels to pick the device up by, headphone jack, unlockable, a continuous light sensor... peak smartphone, save perhaps for the meager 200 Hz accelerometer refresh rate (modern phones have 500 Hz usually, I have no idea what for but I personally love toying with FFT plots)
Waterproof phones all still have charging ports and no flaps. Not sure how but that seems to be solved. Maybe that one part's connectors are encased in glue?
Yes and don't forget consumer preferences. This is Hacker News where they are still clamoring for a "small smartphone" because everything else is too big. Shocker, small phones don't sell. Neither do bulky ones when compared to sleek iPhones.
Not sure if I should be repeating the same answer below each instance of the question but here goes: See the Samsung Galaxy S5 for example as having a good waterproofing rating and user-replaceable battery
Every post about the EU here gets absolutely flooded by negative comments of people who tell me that whatever the EU proposed won't work, governments shouldn't do these things, the proposed legislation is ineffective, it doesn't go far enough, they're just trying to extract money from our successful American companies, and so on and so forth. It's just a neverending diarrhoea of anti-government anti-European underbelly sentiment.
That sounds like seeing a pattern where there is none (apophenia). Do you have examples of posts that wouldn't be downvoted outside of times where Europe/Africa is awake, or that weren't only because it was posted outside of said hours?
Edit: misread Wikipedia apophenia article, could remove quite a bit of text here
I think most (all?) would already comply. What laptop do you see as not having a user replacable battery? Even MacBook can be swapped out pretty easily [1].
I won't name brands, but there are lots of low cost "tablet with keyboard" laptops with glued battery. Just a couple of months ago I had to ditch one.
Anyway, if most comply, why not make it mandatory? Or are these kind of directives only aimed at picking fights with manufacturers?
Note that I am not suggesting that all laptops should have USB-C chargers, that's a separate directive. I mean user replaceable batteries available for at least 5 years, without requiring major surgery to replace.
This is idiotic. What's next, disallowing unified memory or SoC with packaged memory? These people think they know better than world experts on these matters.
Damn, recently I had a phone with a battery that wasn’t properly glued and it would turn off when shaken. I hope this doesn’t become the norm from now on.
Never had this issue with several cellphones I had in ye olden times when all cellphones had removable batteries. All it takes is a properly designed connector.
Yeah, none of my Nokias with a removable back cover and battery had that issue. What you realistically might've had was instead that you dropped your phone on the floor and the battery came flying out.
Phone manufacturers should be able to seal their phones to prevent unwanted substance egress and to compete on aesthetics. They should also make the seal breachable with consumer-grade hand tools like a hairdryer, suction cup, and plastic wedges.
The inside of the phone should use standard screws and securing mechanisms, and batteries should not be glued to the phone.
I actually really like what Apple's been doing with its new batteries by sealing them in metal. That way if a user is being careless and accidentally slips a screwdriver under the back of their phone, the risk that they puncture their battery and start a fire is greatly reduced.
It secures the most dangerous component of your device in a way that makes it easy for anyone to remove and replace safely. I'm sure Apple has a robot to rip the battery out of its case at its recycling plant, and if the phone gets dropped in a lake or something, if that battery eventually catastrophically fails, at least it's wrapped in a suit of armor.
Yikes, I don't live in the EU, but I absolutely don't want this. Maybe I'm mistaken and they could have achieved the same with removable batteries, but my phone is completely waterproof, dustproof, and has survived more than a few hard drops with no case. I would definitely take that over a replaceable battery. Again, I acknowledge they might not be mutually exclusive.
As the law is written, the latest iPhones, for example, would be compliant (battery is replaceable with commercially available tools under the self-repair program), and they are completely waterproof and dustproof. Some manufacturers now use glued seals for their phones and would probably need to change their approach in design, but I think the majority would be okay with minimal changes.
Like others have pointed out, if phones can certify using batteries with 1000 cycles of charge above 80%, they'll also be exempt, so this will likely only affect very cheap models.
With respect, maybe read the article? You're against it, because you didn't read what is being mandated and instead just invented worst-case scenarios instead. You're against your own Strawman.
The proposal is: batteries must be removable using commercially available tools, if the manufacturer requires specialist tools then they must provide them for free.
Essentially they're banning specialized tools, and mandating that repair shops and consumers must be able to purchase replacement batteries for "at least five years."
For context the iPhone was already altered to be compliant with this law and none of the issues you raised were notably worse in the iPhone Air, or 17.
This likely will eliminate specialist software to "sync" batteries, and non-standard screws/attachment mechanisms.
> The proposal is: batteries must be removable using commercially available tools
That's exactly what he's against, plus the premise "Making batteries removable prevents them from being waterproof, dustproof, and collision resistant". Which may be true or false, but not a straw man.
It absolutely is a Strawman. There's no basis in fact for why using commercial tools instead of specialist tools would result in worse "waterproof, dustproof, or collision resistance." It is completely fictional claim invented whole cloth.
Again, multiple phones have already become compliant with this law and didn't lose or compromise any of those things.
So you OR they, will need to explain the basis for the claim, otherwise it is just a Strawman you're poking baselessly.
While this is a good step forward, it feels like complaining about the 0.025% of plastic from straws in the ocean while ignoring the 75% of plastic from fishing nets.
I own a 2020 Kona EV. The battery cannot be upgraded. Eventually, I'll have to replace the entire car to get a longer range. BEVs should be mandated to have upgradable batteries and modular interfaces so that the shell can continue to be reused, the batteries (and BMS) upgraded, and old batteries easily recycled.
Useful life of most of the cars is on par with their battery longevity, as long as you have proper thermal management and your usage patterns are not outliers.
Focusing on being able to upgrade battery (and to be clear - upgrade, not replaced/repair) is solving 1% problem.
You bought a car with some range, you are fine with it. Why you have to replace it with longer range?
Should I be able to eventually replace gas tank with the larger one in my ICE vehicle?
Batteries degrade, you know.
Yes, which is why they are replacable, and Hyundai is bound by law to keep making batteries for OP's Kona for a good while even after the production stops.
I don't see how that's even remotely comparable. It's not like you can replace the battery in your phone with a larger one. You will be able to buy a new battery for your car, that's already guaranteed in the EU - but it will be the same capacity as what you got.
I don't know why is this even an argument really, like.....in a petrol car, do you expect to be able to fit it with a bigger fuel tank after 10 years? or a more powerful engine? Until very recently even software updates to the infotainment weren't really a thing, if you wanted a newer interface you had to change the entire car(I'm not saying this was a good thing, just that generally the expectation is that the product will work the way it was when you bought it).
it's all virtue signalling. Always has been.
Disagree. I want a replaceable battery in my phone. They can get to extensible memory next. And it's not because you don't care about something that you should remove this freedom from me. And don't tell me that the market will self regulate in the best interests of the consumer or other nonsense like that.
I was looking forward to finally be able to easily switch out (i)Phone batteries again - after 20 years - but turns out the lobbyists managed to get a loophole in the law - exempting Apple & Co from making their phones more repairable / longer live-able.
> If a battery can do 1000 cycles and remain above 80% capacity it is exempt
What proportion of devices would need to meet this 80% rule? 50%? 90%? 99%? Could make a huge difference
> If a battery can do 1000 cycles and remain above 80% capacity it is exempt
Is there a definition for a cycle? 80->85%? 33->72? 22-83? 87->96? Would each of these be a "cycle"?
A battery cycle is a full discharge/charge cycle (100 -> 0 -> 100). Going from 70% to 20% and then charging back to 70% is half a cycle.
My iPhone 14 is 1081 days old, charged every night, battery capacity is reported as 81%. So in Apple's own measurements this is possible.
I guess there is some built in spare capacity, but that may still qualify for the exemption?
The exemption is about ensuring customers get what they paid for. It shouldn’t care how the manufacturer achieves that; driving the batteries less hard is an obvious tactic, and actually also makes them safer to use.
If you charge every night from say 50%, that's not a full cycle.
Seems entirely reasonable. Embedded batteries have a lot of advantages. Cheaper, higher battery capacity, water proof, smaller, stronger. I think this will largely just make the mid to low tier android market in the EU shittier.
Citation needed.
All of those can be achieved with replaceable batteries.
Citation needed. It seems pretty clear that a mechanism to allow a user to access a battery will increase complexity, making all the other properties harder to achieve.
Yes, this is the most non-story I have ever seen on this topic. I do not know of any manufacturer who does not claim this, verifiable or otherwise; and even if they can't claim it, all they have to do is one minor purely-software capacity adjustment, which they will gladly do before they will even consider offering removable batteries.
What a disappointment.
Apple has no chance to claim their batteries can have 80% capacity after 1000 cycles seeing how they never achieved this so far. Lying about it puts them in a world of mass recalls and fraud investigations.
Depends on how "cycle" is defined - I'm sure they can finagle it so "any charge added to the battery" counts as a cycle.
As a datapoint my iPhone reports 522 cycles and 89% max - from march 2024. I do use the "limit charging to 80%" feature which I suspect may become mandatory before 2027 ...
>Depends on how "cycle" is defined - I'm sure they can finagle it so "any charge added to the battery" counts as a cycle.
the definition of a battery cycle is very well established. there isnt really any room to finagle it.
I'm pretty the spec sheet claimed 1000 cycles when I bought my iPhone 17.
They do claim it at least for iPhone 15 "under ideal conditions": https://support.apple.com/en-us/101575
No shot at all apple batteries can last 1000 cycles and remain above 80% capacity. Probably can’t even do 300 in my experience. Sounds like an easy lawsuit.
No doubt they will redefine maximum battery capacity to a figure that does achieve 80% over 1000 cycles. If you under-declare maximum capacity then there is a lot of headroom for actual degradation before you start to show degradation to the user.
iPhone 17 Pro launch specs:
> Video Playback: Up to 27* hours
> *: 25 hours in the EU
This is what they should have been doing all along. My Pixel tells me that charging above 80% is bad for battery longevity and I should set a charge limit. Well then maybe 80% should be the new 100% and the advertised capacity should be the 80%.
They can use a large battery and software lock the capacity to 50% but that would be very wasteful and expensive for them, and make for a very chonky phone.
Or they can use a normal battery, label it with a lower capacity and actually allow you to use all of it but that would be lying and probably very illegal especially when it comes to mislabeling batteries.
I would wager that batteries that powered down at 20% and that halt charging at 80% would be significantly prolonged.
If Apple resorts to those tactics, then there is no limit in moving the goalposts.
A battery that can support 1000 cycles and remain above 80% capacity would be a literal brick. For an example the Vision Pro's battery has extreme over-provisioning and limit how long it would last. (note I know it is removable but that isn't the point).
In the meantime, my daily driver here in reality land: https://i.imgur.com/8yEEJVb.png
That has not been my experience, at least with Apple laptops. Even when rated for 1000 cycles, I'll get the warning that service is needed (AFAIK that means 80% capacity or lower) well before then. I've seen this on several, but the one I just checked is at just under 670 cycles and has had that warning up for some months already.
Maybe iPhones are better about this, though, I don't know. But I definitely don't have a lot of faith in the laptops maintaining 80% for 1000 cycles.
212 cycles, still 100% capacity (maybe 99.5 rounded up) "relative to when it was new". Doesn't that seem a bit dodgy to you?
>The regulation states that batteries must be removable using ‘commercially available’ tools
This is doing a lot of work here. There's enough wiggle room for this to be absolutely meaningless. Anything short of I can slide off the back cover and maybe unscrew two or three screws to replace the battery means that a lot of people are going to end up not being able to replace the batteries.
The rest of that same sentence, " – and that if specialised tools are required, they must be provided free of charge when the phone or tablet is purchased," seems to mitigate that concern, no? I suppose it hinges on what the test for a "specialized tool" is.
You can buy a soldering kit for 100$ USD. That doesn't mean normal people are going to be able to use them.
I'd rather force larger companies to offer battery replacement at cost + shipping.
I have no real interest and opening up my own devices and messing with batteries, but I have no problem paying the manufacturer $100 for service.
EU regulatory bodies haven’t been as blindly sycophantic towards megacorporations in terms of allowing them to skirt by rules set forth by their legislatures, so I would be more optimistic than if this were a development in US law.
In that context it seems like "specialized" means "not commercially available", no?
Toss: "technically you can purchase a new phone with non-specialist tool 'cash' so we feel no need to provide anything at all"
Specialised as in created specifically for swapping battery of that specific phone? As in you cannot do it with a generic commercially available tool (e.g. a screwdriver)
Quote from https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=OJ:C...
--- start quote ---
Article 11 of Regulation (EU) 2023/1542 states that a battery shall be considered readily removable by the end-user where it can be removed from a product with the use of commercially available tools, without requiring the use of specialised tools, unless provided free of charge with the product, proprietary tools, thermal energy, or solvents to disassemble the product.
Guidance on tool types can be drawn from standard EN 45554:2020e (2). In the context of the assessment of a product’s ability to be repaired, reused and upgraded, this standard uses the following classification groups: (i) basic tools (including those provided with the product as a spare part) or no tools; (ii) product-group specific tools; (iii) commercially available tools; and (iv) proprietary tools.
The concept of commercially available tools mentioned in Article 11 comprises the categories of basic tools or no tools and of commercially available tools as per EN 45554:2020e.
The concept of specialised tools laid down in the Regulation refers to product-group specific tools that are not available for purchase by the general public but are not protected by patents either. Article 11 requires that any such specialised tool that might be necessary to have a portable battery removed and replaced is provided free of charge with the product into which the battery is incorporated.
As per EN 45554:2020e, proprietary tools refer to tools not available for purchase by the general public, or for which any applicable patent are not available for license under fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory terms. Such tools should not be needed to remove portable batteries
--- start quote ---
(I fully expect literally no one on HN to spend even a second looking for and reading the relevant texts, and complain about the law being vague or impossible to implement or something)
> without requiring […] thermal energy, or solvents to disassemble the product.
No heat or solvents required. Sounds good.
Maybe. Maybe not. If my local phone and phone accessories shop can do it for little money in 15 minutes then the current calculus changes for a heck of a lot of people.
Isn't that already the case though?
No. I can't find a legit battery for my Samsung phone, only forgeries and "compatible with"s. Local repair shop said they could put a new OEM battery into this 4yo second-hand phone
So I pay them and they do it. The result:
- back cover becomes rather loose while it's warm e.g. from fast charging or a hot day out. No longer waterproof
- the battery is no better than the original and is (2y later now) degrading faster than the original. If you ask a lot of it, the last 35% are gone within minutes. I think it's a knock-off battery but that the repair person doesn't know that
If there had been commercially available repair parts and tool access, neither would have been a problem and I could just have done it myself
My mom has the same model and sent hers in to the manufacturer for a battery swap. Took a while and cost half the price of the phone (since it was a 2yo second-hand at that time). That could have been much faster, even if the manufacturer is free to set the same steep prices
A colleague got their phone back from Google for some repair last week, I don't remember if screen or battery swap. He asked and they said it wouldn't be reset. He put a sticker on it not to wipe the device. They wiped the device. He's now trying to piece together what's in various backup files that Android allows making. Fun fun fun. Also not necessary if you, or your techy nephew, can just do it at home
---
The requirement for commercially availability of repair is so much better than the current state of what repair places can/are offering
I think the supply chain is pretty broken. I had just about the same experience as you with an iPhone 7 a few years back. I booked my replacement through Apple's website, so I was pretty confident I wouldn't get scammed. The new battery started bulging in less than two years, to the point that there was a serious gap between the screen and the body.
It was clearly worse than the battery that came with my refurbished (!) phone, which never did that; it just couldn't hold a decent charge anymore. I won't even go into the absolutely ridiculous experience I had with the repair shop, like not honoring booked times and whatnot and having me wait in line for ages, both to drop off and pick up my phone.
My current phone has lost some of its battery health as reported by the OS, but still gives me over a day of use, but when the time comes to fix it, I'll go directly to Apple.
Same with laptops btw. I once caught a seller where the store and sticker said 5200 mAh but acpi -i reported 4400 mAh. They provided a replacement free of charge, presumably their supplier scammed them in turn (it was a small local webshop), but that also wasn't great even if now the chip reported the expected capacity. Never once have I had good experiences with replacement batteries, I really wonder what they do with the originals to make them so vastly superior
Also quite noticeable that the laptop battery market became much smaller once the batteries became an internal component (around 2015) that you can't see without opening it up completely. These also used to be a slider or two
People don't dare unscrew electronics, even if it's about as trivial as replacing a light bulb in a fixture that requires removing a screw. With phones having the battery inside as well now, not above the sim tray anymore for example, I wonder how much such legislation is going to help the average person
Last time I checked I’d have to leave my phone for a couple of days and the glue factor meant they wouldn’t guarantee it would come back perfectly. My assumption is this might make it a more trivial change.
I don't see what change they can make, at least to an iPhone. The glue is necessary for water resistance.
There were models that were both waterproof and not glued (the only tools needed for a battery swap were the replacement battery and opposable thumbs). I never had/tested one myself though, this is just going off of the manufacturer's claims and IP (ingress protection) certification
I used to have a Galaxy S5, the model that usually comes up in these discussions. Now, I never went and threw it in a swimming pool, or pressure washed it, or whatever other ridiculous test you may come up with. But I did attach it to my motorbike's handlebars and rode around under heavy rain on more occasions than I care to remember.
It was often drenched to the point that the map on the screen was basically illegible without stopping and wiping off the water. But it never skipped a beat. Basically, I was the limiting factor and would eventually give up and find some hotel with a hot shower to pass the night.
Glue is not required. Gaskets and other methods exist.
So why can't I buy the glue?
If it is a special glue that needs to be heated (or something), I should be able to make/buy an oven the does the cure procedures.
Necessary? Gaskets and o-rings haven't been invented yet?
They have, and people preferred smaller phones.
People didn't prefer shit. This is a supply-driven market, vendors put out whatever they want, and we deal with it.
Did you forget how to not buy things?
And then they got larger again.
My last phone was all glued and the entry point was the screen. The repair guy said there was a 50% chance the screen would break in trying to unglue it so it was not worth the try. It was a shame, it was a decent phone killed prematurely by a faulty battery.
There are a number of phone designs that require special heating apparatus and very careful prying tools to get the back case off. And then extremely careful application of new glue to reassemble. Basically the whole thing is glued together at the factory. Google "phone heating pad for repair" for some examples...
That reads true. While replaceability is definitely a good thing, but whether it will end up being a good thing for the average user (and not lead to some further price hikes in the EU market) remains to be seen.
I presume it means "don't even try doing the printer ink DRM thing".
better than glued.
Heat guns and pryers are commercially available. I don't think this will change anything there.
You're wrong about that:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47835530
Also Stanley's Fubar and CAT 797 trucks are commercially available, doesn't mean I will need one of those to change my phone battery :)
And Pentalobe screwdrivers are also commercially available now, so Apple doesn't even have to include one...
And lose water resistance…
Aren't today's phone batteries already replaceable with commercially available tools? I can walk into a store with my iPhone and walk out with a replaced battery 20 minutes later.
This isn't even what drives obsolesce of phones, it's software updates.
If you really want to be able to self-swap your own battery, you can just buy an Android that has a replaceable battery.
Do we need to regulate something that isn't a problem? All regulation has downsides, is it worth paying this price here?
They're taking "commercially available" to mean things like a screwdriver - not a $1000 phone disassembly machine.
People shouldn't have to go to a special store or buy special tools requiring special skills to change a battery.
In a perfect world, sure. But people also want phones these days that are physically durable, have some degree of waterproofing/water resistance, maximum battery life, etc. Many of the demands and expectations of a modern phone aren't easily compatible with a replaceable battery design that can withstand the incompetence of the average end user.
Engage with the content of his comment instead of resorting to ad hominem.
He's right - the market wants embedded batteries, although perhaps not directly. Embedded batteries have improved price, battery capacity, water proofing, size, and strength. If the consumer really wanted a removable battery and all that that entails then there would be more phones that offered that. The reality is people misjudge what all that entails. By all means, I would love to just make the iPhone battery directly replaceable without any compromises but that's not reality.
I originally did engage with the comment. Water-resistance absolutely is still possible if the replacement battery is waterproof. Water can over time be corrosive at the contacts, but that's a risk for the user. It does not in any way imply that water will enter the internals of the device from the point of contact with the battery. The other argument of size is nonsense because adding 2 mm of thickness is less important than providing five years of extra life.
I'd rather my phone be waterproof than have a battery I can replace myself
It's likely impossible to legislate but it would be nice to say "each generation has to have one user-replaceable battery". Everyone who doesn't care (the 99%) can buy the iPhone 19x, and the people who want replaceable batteries can get the iPhone B.
Why do you imply that the phone could no longer be waterproof? Granted, it would take a bit of extra engineering to make it comparably waterproof. There is no reasonable implication that water would leak into the internals of the device where it makes contact with the battery.
How do you feel about the batteries in electric vehicles?
What about wearable devices like a smartwatch, headphones, smart glasses?
Should all these be consumer-replaceable without tools, regardless of the effect on the other things people value in these devices (waterproofing, size and weight, battery life, etc.)?
FYI I do not work for anything close to the consumer tech industry.
> without tools
With commercially available tools, yes. The argument is that, given the skill, you could pull it off.
Then again, maybe cars are a different category. I really don't have enough skilll to add to this discussion
If a battery can do 1000 cycles and remain above 80% capacity it is exempt from this, which is exactly what Apple implemented a few years ago.
Low cost phones will be most affected.
I was wondering about that. I lost my iPhone 13 mini the other day, did the find my phone beep thing and got a distant beep from my washing machine which was on wash cycle.
Surprisingly the phone was fine and works fine after a brief rinse under the tap. It must be hard to combine that sort of water resistance with easy user changing.
Don't fall for the 'glue cuz of protection' myth - there are and had been water-resistant phones way before Apple started glueing to avoid customers doing their own repairs and them losing out on new sales.
Which phones? I ask as someone that's had to replace multiple phones after a trip through the washing machine.
Modern phone water resistance is incredible. I've even seen people literally swim with their phones and not even question if it was a bad idea.
Samsung Galaxy S5 was the last one that attempted it. IP67 with a removable back cover and swappable battery.
Yes, but IP67 is not nearly as water resistant as IP68, which all modern phones are for the most part.
I'm not knowledgeable enough to know if IP68 could be achieved in a phone without glue. There's no clamping mechanism for the backs, they're just press-fit with small clips.
Fifteen years ago, I had a Garmin GPS (admittedly not a phone, but similar form factor) that survived a week of knocking around the bottom of a raft.
The battery compartment had a rubber gasket and some very tight screws.
Samsung Galaxy S5 is the first one to cross my mind.
Re the repairs, I can get the battery swapped on the 13 mini for £49 which isn't that bad. (iSmash, not Apple).
And they weren't bulky tactical phones that looked like the smartphone equivalent of Humvees?
Is 1000 cycles above 80% even possible without gimping the device like apple does with all its hardware?
And what about if 4 years they says that they have dettected a problem in your battery? A new battery should fix that but now you cannot do it properly because it could do 1000 cycles.
This same thing happened to Pixels 6a after 500 cycles.
Then don’t buy a phone from a company with a piss poor record of customer service.
Just looking in maps, there are three Apple Stores within a 45 minute drive from where I live in central Florida.
The situation is worse in my hometown in South GA admittedly, you have to drive 70 miles for same day service for an authorized repair place - mostly Best Buy.
What if they don't? What if there are manufacturer errors? What if they burn your battery with updates along the way?
Isn't like most of the new phones claim at least 1000 cycles?
> Low cost phones will be most affected.
Not really. Take a 4000 mAh rated cell, advertise it as "rated for 3500 mAh" and that's it.
Isn't this pretty much what Nothing are doing? At least one of their phones has a different battery rating in India than elsewhere, despite containing the same hardware.
Wish they'd have implemented it before the iPhone 14 Pro launched. I'm at 624 cycles right now and my phone's gone below 80% fucking ages ago.
Apple’s replacement program is $99 for out of warranty battery replacement
Not really. The "estimated cost" on Apple.com is 139€ to 199€ depending on which company I take it.
> The regulation states that batteries must be removable using ‘commercially available’ tools
I’m pretty sure that’s more or less already the case, so…
My battery’s at 70%, I could replace it for $50, but I consider it a feature to get me off my goddamn phone more.
Funnily enough I've had a "low cost phone" with replaceable batteries (the "old school way")
So it does not seem a big deal
What if we regulate batteries even more? i.e. what if, in some magical perfect world, the world get's together and agrees on batteries for phones like how we agree on AA,AAA,D,C batteries? Even more though.. a standard connector, a standard comms bus, a variety of sizes, and they were designed for reuse as efficiently as possible.
Now we can scale up volume, swap them out, be free to purchase from a different manufacturer, and have scaled up recycling services.
Batteries have been used as part of planned obsolescence for too long and a whole small business industry of replacing phone batteries has appeared because of it. Next the EU are going to have to address security patches because its another aspect being used to sell new phones.
I have found out that the main phone providers (Apple, Google, Samsung) have extremely long support period. I really don't get the "planned obsolescence" thing.
As an example, in Jan 2026, Apple published iOS 12.5.8 which provides updates for iPhone 5s which released in Sept 2013. That's 12.5 years ago. The equivalent would be to connect to the internet using ADSL in Jan 2000 with your IBM PS/2 rocking in intel 8086, 512 kb of RAM and expecting an update for your DOS operating system.
>As an example, in Jan 2026, Apple published iOS 12.5.8 which provides updates for iPhone 5s which released in Sept 2013. That's 12.5 years ago. The equivalent would be to connect to the internet using ADSL in Jan 2000 with your IBM PS/2 rocking in intel 8086, 512 kb of RAM and expecting an update for your DOS operating system.
The updates for ios 12 are all security updates, not feature updates, so your comparison to "connect to the internet using ADSL in Jan 2000 with your IBM PS/2 rocking in intel 8086" doesn't really make sense. The phones stuck on ios 15 are basically unusable because many apps don't support it anymore. At best you can download an older version from a few years ago, but that depends on whether the backend servers were updated. Apps that insist you use the latest version (eg. banking/finance apps) basically unusable.
A phone is not unusable because some banking apps don't work on it. It didn't even ship with said apps installed.
Machines were roughly doubling in performance every year back in 2000.
Nowadays they are doubling in performance every... 5 years?
The EU already requires 5 years of patches since last year. Motorola thinks they have found a loophole, so there are still some, ahem, patches needed to the law.
> Batteries have been used as part of planned obsol[esc]ence for too long and a whole small business industry of replacing phone batteries has appeared because of it.
Note that early phones had replaceable batteries and it was later phones that dropped that feature. The idea wasn't that making the phone impossible to open would compel people to replace their phone faster; it was that given that people didn't keep their phones long enough to wear out the battery, there was no need to make the battery accessible.
That was true 15-20 years ago. Nowadays changing the phone is basically because:
1) battery dying / not lasting enough
2) shattered glasses whose replacement costs 35-40% of the cost of the phone new (for budget/mid-range phones, not everybody has iPhones)
distant 3rd) not enough free internal storage
Unrelated note but, cheap/midrange phones are a scam, you almost always get better value purchasing a second hand premium one.
also camera just not being satisfying enough anymore is a big deal
sure on highest end phones you have very good cameras since a long time by now, but even there they find improvements here and there (e.g. zoom, low light pictures, even better image stabilization)
but middle to lower end phones are still have major improvements in every generation of a certain brand/line/price category. And you might be satisfied with a "acceptable" quality camera, until everyone around you has way nicer photos, or you now have a reason to make photes you didn't had in the past, or you get older and your hands a bit unsteady etc.
Batteries are generally a cheap fix from third party stores. If you wanted to keep the phone why not spend the small dollars and just replace the battery?
Because you need to bring it to a shop, sometimes they may keep it for more times, sometimes if they are not that honest they will find something else and factory reset it and a long etc. If it's something one can do at home by one self as an expected and supported by the vendor operation, why not? You can still bring it to a store if you don't feel like crafty enough to do it.
Upgrade cycles have slowed down in recent years, the improvements are relatively incremental nowadays. Screens, durability, processors, storage sizes, cameras, even battery life are okay-ish and aren't improving quickly enough to justify the same upgrade rate. Foldables are basically the only big innovation in recent years, but are still a little too fragile and expensive.
This is also reflected in the increasing support durations from major manufacturers.
This might be partially true, but making them inacessible is still a great way approach to planned obsolescence and there's no way this was not part of the motivation. The fact that an entire industry exists to provide replacement batteries is proof of this, as is the fact that Apple offers a £100 battery replacement. They also replace the batteries of all refurbished models they sell, which again wouldn't be necessary if battery life wasn't a concern over the useful life of a phone.
Secondly, what you said may have been true in the past, when smartphones were rapidly evolving and upgrade cycles were short, but people are holding on to their devices for longer now, so its possible its becoming a problem again.
Batteries on early cell phones needed to be replaced multiple times a day. I remember talk time of like 10 minutes on my motorola StarTec.
Nowadays batteries seem to be doing pretty good, though. I've got a galax s20 fe, and the battery is still fine after 5 years.
This was true back when Moore's law was the driver of obsolescence. You bought a new phone every year simply because next year's phone was twice as fast.
Now that this doesn't happen, the driver of obsolescence is the battery, which is much less defensible because you can swap it much more easily than "the whole internals of the phone".
Seems to me like the top goal should be: you can easily replace the most-likely-to-break parts (screen, back, battery, etc) in any local independent repair shop, with genuine parts that have low markups.
I'm confused why that still isn't the case today given all the EU headlines we've seen over the years.
What percent of iphone users would take a sleeker, slimmer phone over a replaceable battery?
This is excellent news. Now make them have user-unlockable and user-relockable bootloaders...
Next: replaceable storage? Since flash-based storage is widely known as a consumable that tends to fail first.
I hate to say it, but the lack of removable batteries serves a purpose. It wasn't done just because 'screw consumers'.
It was done because:
* It makes phones massively easier to waterproof
* It allows for larger batteries
* It allows for more compact and lighter phones
Consumers, based on what they buy, have shown again and again that they want these features.
It also simplifies manufacture and lowers costs, which everyone likes.
I like removable batteries. If I had the option, I'd get a phone with that feature. But I know that I am certainly in the minority, as is almost everyone in this thread.
It's also worth pointing out that these days, battery and software have advanced to the point where degradation is quite slow in many cases. The phone will often outlive its useful life due to specs rather than battery.
They need a standardized battery. Something with common terminals and width available in a range of thicknesses and lengths would be ideal.
They (Samsung, Apple, etc.) should never have been allowed to glue it behind the screen. Threaded fasteners and a silicone gasket cover is good enough for 99.999% of the public use-case.
I still sometimes miss the Samsung Galaxy I had that had a microSD slot, a removable battery, and a headphone jack.
Phones have lost so much in a decade.
I have a Samsung Galaxy from 2022 that has exactly that and it's still supported by manufacturer. Unfortunately it's a Samsung Galaxy Tab Active4 Pro.
Will this affect the water-resistance of current iPhones? I thought that was why the batteries are not easily replaceable by users, because of the seals/gaskets.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dyL6hMZvWQ
water resistance + easily battery exchange for repairs is very viable (AFIK always had been, too.)
like this law isn't about users causally replacing batteries like on very old phones
but about an repair shop easily and without risk of breaking your phone being able to replace it without only holding on your phone for idk. 10 minutes
So that you can just drop by (once they have the replacement parts) wait a moment and have a new battery.
This means in the worst case something like needing to a add a bit of additional seal/wax/glue or similar to improve sealing is very much fully viable (Id the sealing agent is generally buy able.)
It just is something you have to design in from the get to go. And it's easier to not do so at all. And maybe if you obsess if your phone is 1/10mm smaller or not that gets in your way too. And not doing so is more profitable as people will buy successor products more likely, even if just very slightly more likely.
But in general? That really isn't the problem.
Also even if it where the problem. What is better? Having a less waterproof phone, but not needing to buy a new one for another one or two years or having to buy one now?
There are multiple watches, cameras, etc., with a lot of physical buttons even, all with replaceable batteries and weather-resistant (or even better, water proof). This is a bad excuse.
Most wristwatches provide much stronger water resistance while still being very user serviceable with a $20 watch tool kit. Whatever the phone makers are peddling are mostly excuses.
Galaxy S5 worked quite well. IP67 and a removable battery.
While I'd be perfectly content with an IP67 iPhone with interchangeable battery, the current iPhones are IP68 which is a significant step up in dust/water ingress protection. IP68 devices generally require a sealant, IP67 normally doesn't, making it easier to do a battery hatch etc.
IP68 doesn't require a sealant if you just use enough pressure. Phones are just too thin to screw on the back plate and use a proper gasket. Which is stupid in the first place because most people then go and put a bulky cover on them.
How about computers to have replaceable SSDs? There's no point you can exchange the battery when the hard-soldered SSD dies first. (I had more dead SSDs than batteries)
At least there's a choice there. I've never bought a computer with a soldered-on SSD.
This should be mandatory, although I never had a computer where the SSD was not replaceable.
Some were a bit of a pain in the ass to replace though.
And get rid of soldered RAM while we're at it as well.
Awesome!
And next, hopefully, replaceable software.
Which will do much more for phone longevity.
Recently replaced the battery and charging port of my Fairphone. 5 screws, two plucked components, done. Hopefully this means that soon you won't have to buy a specific company's phone for this marvelous experience.
The Fairphone 5 is only IP55 rated (dust protected, and water droplet resistant). Most flagship phones are IP68 rated (fully dust sealed, and water submersible). IP68 phones are sealed with a single-use adhesive gasket, and replacing battery requires breaking (and replacing) this seal. If the seal is improperly applied, the phone is no longer protected from dust or water.
Neat. That may allow repurposing phones as mini home servers too.
Lithium batteries in things running 24/7 unsupervised always makes me a bit nervous
It seems like the whole world could massively benefit from this much like the other great innovation out of the EU -- the Common Charger Directive (aka USB-C).
Gigaset makes IP68/MIL-STD-810H smartphones with removable batteries and sold the battery for 30€, don't fall for the "but watterproof".
I thought USB-C was already required.
> The move comes amid EU-wide efforts to cut the continent’s carbon footprint and tackle mounting waste [...]
...
> [...] if specialised tools are required, they must be provided free of charge when the phone or tablet is purchased.
So if a family buys several phones and tablets that all use the same specialized tool to change their batteries they end up with several identical specialized tools?
From a reducing waste perspective wouldn't it be better to just require that the tool be available for free for some reasonable amount of time such as however long the manufacturer is required to support the device?
Considering that this, and other, regulation is to officially aimed at reducing e-waste, the EU should commit to publish independent data on the amount of e-waste and phones replacement rates now and every year afterwards in order to measure the real world impact.
Too often, including in HN comments, those regulations ate presented as "obviously" good policies. Well, data are better than assumptions.
I don't know if this is standard, but at least for some previously enacted electronics regulations I know they look into the real-world effects. I think I was looking for information on how they calculate the battery life for the new smartphone energy labels (which videos should be played at what screen brightness; is the browsing test over WiFi or the LTE/NR modem; etc.) when I found some document about how much energy they're expecting to save with this regulation. It showed a base path of expected energy consumption development, and then how the regulation is expected to modify that
Edit: not the one I saw before, but found a similar document via https://energy-efficient-products.ec.europa.eu -> policy making -> "EIA reports and related analyses" -> 2025 overview report https://circabc.europa.eu/ui/group/418195ae-4919-45fa-a959-3... -> see e.g. the graphic at the top of page 79
The shaded area is the effect that they think is attributable to regulations, e.g. -2.2TWh electricity per year in the category of phones and tablets when comparing 2010 and 2030
As another example, for "Servers and data storage products" they expect almost no change due to regulation: the consumption is expected to go from 48 to 67 TWh (2010 till 2030) and that it would have been 70 TWh without regulations. If I'm reading it right, this small improvement would be due to the 2019 "information requirement ... including the maximum allowed operating temperature for the equipment ... to stimulate data centres to choose equipment that supports higher operating temperatures, to enable further reduction of the cooling load."
Page 42 shows that they also take into account 'additional acquisition costs' (how much more expensive devices are because of this, I think that means?), but that this added expense is well below the energy costs that would have been incurred otherwise. Of course, that's what I'd say too about my regulations :) but I don't know of another information source for this so this is the best info I have atm
I am simply not a fan of this type of legislation. It reminds me of CA bullet button. I also don’t quite understand the purpose. Official retail cost from Apple in the US ~$120. Third-party you can usually get it around $60. Sure the battery does not have quick accessibility but I can replace it pretty cheaply.
Agreed. This rule will likely be irrelevant in 5-10 years when battery technology improves, and it has such a huge carve out (batteries that maintain 80% capacity after 1000 cycles are exempt) every phone manufacture can get around it. Phone makers can meet this regulation by artificially limiting battery capacity through software to protect battery health. Or they could put in a 10,000 mAh battery and only allow the user to use 8,000 of it, and use the rest as buffer.
A better example is the EU cookie consent law. The intent was to make websites stop using cookies, but what resulted was websites didn't change anything except put up annoying consent banners, and made the internet experience worse.
So this means no iPhone Air 2 in Europe? I can hardly see Apple wiggle around the special tools requirement when these batteries are glued and sealed shut in the devices.
[edit] didn’t see the fine print with the cycles requirement etc. so it seems Apple etc is still safe.
Well, 9 more months until I’m going to replace my iPhone 12!
This is good. I recently had to replace a generally working phone because the battery was dying and there was no cost effective & reliable means of replacing.
A proper gasket and screws needs to be the standard solution here.
Hopefully the EU can get the battery situation to mirror the charging cable situation. IE force them all to adopt an industry standard.
Hot swap batteries! Who's going to offer THAT first?
As a non-European I want to say: thanks EU
Awesome! hopefully apple will just stop selling their filth here entirely.
I understood that the move to non-replaceable batteries was at least partially driven by water resistance
*Edit. Not sure why people are downvoting. I didn't make a positive declaration. HN didn't used to be this way for completely milquetoast comments.
It probably makes things easier, but its unlikely that the industry that found a way to make foldables waterproof couldn't figure out a way to put rubber gaskets on battery covers. And in fact, they did, there were several devices introduced in the transition period that had both features.
Rubber gaskets wear out. Best practice is to replace them every time you open the cover. We can put them in, but the replacement battery better come with the gasket because you can't safely replace the battery without a new gasket.
Galaxy S5 was IP67-rated (1 metre depth, 30 minutes) and had a user-replaceable back cover / battery
Also a notification LED, OLED screen, bezels to pick the device up by, headphone jack, unlockable, a continuous light sensor... peak smartphone, save perhaps for the meager 200 Hz accelerometer refresh rate (modern phones have 500 Hz usually, I have no idea what for but I personally love toying with FFT plots)
If the headphone port flap was perfectly sealed….
*charge port flap
Waterproof phones all still have charging ports and no flaps. Not sure how but that seems to be solved. Maybe that one part's connectors are encased in glue?
Yes and don't forget consumer preferences. This is Hacker News where they are still clamoring for a "small smartphone" because everything else is too big. Shocker, small phones don't sell. Neither do bulky ones when compared to sleek iPhones.
Haven't modern smartphones had non-replaceable batteries long before they had any kind of water resistance ratings?
Not sure if I should be repeating the same answer below each instance of the question but here goes: See the Samsung Galaxy S5 for example as having a good waterproofing rating and user-replaceable battery
Anything except full support of the EU during European hours gets downvoted
Every post about the EU here gets absolutely flooded by negative comments of people who tell me that whatever the EU proposed won't work, governments shouldn't do these things, the proposed legislation is ineffective, it doesn't go far enough, they're just trying to extract money from our successful American companies, and so on and so forth. It's just a neverending diarrhoea of anti-government anti-European underbelly sentiment.
That sounds like seeing a pattern where there is none (apophenia). Do you have examples of posts that wouldn't be downvoted outside of times where Europe/Africa is awake, or that weren't only because it was posted outside of said hours?
Edit: misread Wikipedia apophenia article, could remove quite a bit of text here
They should extend the principle to laptops, obviously.
I think most (all?) would already comply. What laptop do you see as not having a user replacable battery? Even MacBook can be swapped out pretty easily [1].
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgTon2jqI-A
I won't name brands, but there are lots of low cost "tablet with keyboard" laptops with glued battery. Just a couple of months ago I had to ditch one.
Anyway, if most comply, why not make it mandatory? Or are these kind of directives only aimed at picking fights with manufacturers?
Note that I am not suggesting that all laptops should have USB-C chargers, that's a separate directive. I mean user replaceable batteries available for at least 5 years, without requiring major surgery to replace.
I hope someday EU will implement requirements for phones -> You must be able to flash any firmware (OS) on your phone, without any restrictions.
This is much more important, than batteries.
This is idiotic. What's next, disallowing unified memory or SoC with packaged memory? These people think they know better than world experts on these matters.
Have they researched durability with replaceable batteries and can promise us phones won't break more often?
Don't remember that being necessary to taketh away, and now that they're required to giveth it back we don't want it anymore?!
Now do screens.
and software.
Damn, recently I had a phone with a battery that wasn’t properly glued and it would turn off when shaken. I hope this doesn’t become the norm from now on.
Never had this issue with several cellphones I had in ye olden times when all cellphones had removable batteries. All it takes is a properly designed connector.
Yeah, none of my Nokias with a removable back cover and battery had that issue. What you realistically might've had was instead that you dropped your phone on the floor and the battery came flying out.
Behold: the widget of the future.
A spring.
Phone manufacturers should be able to seal their phones to prevent unwanted substance egress and to compete on aesthetics. They should also make the seal breachable with consumer-grade hand tools like a hairdryer, suction cup, and plastic wedges.
The inside of the phone should use standard screws and securing mechanisms, and batteries should not be glued to the phone.
I actually really like what Apple's been doing with its new batteries by sealing them in metal. That way if a user is being careless and accidentally slips a screwdriver under the back of their phone, the risk that they puncture their battery and start a fire is greatly reduced.
It secures the most dangerous component of your device in a way that makes it easy for anyone to remove and replace safely. I'm sure Apple has a robot to rip the battery out of its case at its recycling plant, and if the phone gets dropped in a lake or something, if that battery eventually catastrophically fails, at least it's wrapped in a suit of armor.
Yikes, I don't live in the EU, but I absolutely don't want this. Maybe I'm mistaken and they could have achieved the same with removable batteries, but my phone is completely waterproof, dustproof, and has survived more than a few hard drops with no case. I would definitely take that over a replaceable battery. Again, I acknowledge they might not be mutually exclusive.
As the law is written, the latest iPhones, for example, would be compliant (battery is replaceable with commercially available tools under the self-repair program), and they are completely waterproof and dustproof. Some manufacturers now use glued seals for their phones and would probably need to change their approach in design, but I think the majority would be okay with minimal changes.
Like others have pointed out, if phones can certify using batteries with 1000 cycles of charge above 80%, they'll also be exempt, so this will likely only affect very cheap models.
I don't have the same experience at all. For me, battery life is the #1 reason of obsolescence of my smartphones.
With respect, maybe read the article? You're against it, because you didn't read what is being mandated and instead just invented worst-case scenarios instead. You're against your own Strawman.
The proposal is: batteries must be removable using commercially available tools, if the manufacturer requires specialist tools then they must provide them for free.
Essentially they're banning specialized tools, and mandating that repair shops and consumers must be able to purchase replacement batteries for "at least five years."
For context the iPhone was already altered to be compliant with this law and none of the issues you raised were notably worse in the iPhone Air, or 17.
This likely will eliminate specialist software to "sync" batteries, and non-standard screws/attachment mechanisms.
> You're against your own Strawman.
> The proposal is: batteries must be removable using commercially available tools
That's exactly what he's against, plus the premise "Making batteries removable prevents them from being waterproof, dustproof, and collision resistant". Which may be true or false, but not a straw man.
It absolutely is a Strawman. There's no basis in fact for why using commercial tools instead of specialist tools would result in worse "waterproof, dustproof, or collision resistance." It is completely fictional claim invented whole cloth.
Again, multiple phones have already become compliant with this law and didn't lose or compromise any of those things.
So you OR they, will need to explain the basis for the claim, otherwise it is just a Strawman you're poking baselessly.