It's Going To Cost More To Replace Your iPhone 14's Battery

It seems that the iPhone has gone full circle as far as battery cost is concerned because, for the first time in years, the price of a battery replacement has increased considerably. Starting with the iPhone 14, you will have to pay much more to replace the battery in your iPhone, even though the hardware cost remains largely unchanged. With an over 40% increase in price, iPhone users need to prepare themselves for some pretty expensive replacements in the future.

Battery replacements can and do happen regardless of the overall health of your phone. If you're noticing that your battery life is not giving you as much mileage as it used to, that's normal, as phone batteries deteriorate over time. If you tend to use the same phone for a longer amount of time, you might run into a problem where the battery is just not good enough anymore and needs to be replaced. In the case of Apple, you can only replace the battery through the company's AppleCare+ program if the battery health has been rated at 80 percent or less.

Apple claims iPhone batteries retain up to 80% of their original capacity at the point of hitting 500 complete charge cycles. There's a one-year warranty that lets you replace a defective battery, and you can use AppleCare+ once the battery health drops low enough, assuming you signed up for the program. However, if these don't apply to you, be prepared to shell out some of your hard-earned cash at an authorized Apple repair store.

As first spied by Ars Technica, replacing the battery in any of the iPhone 14 models will be considerably more expensive than with older models: the service is now priced at $99. For comparison, Apple only charges $69 for battery replacements on the iPhone 13, 12, 11, and X. The latest iPhone SE as well as the iPhone 8 and older models are priced at $49. However, comparing just the iPhone 13 and iPhone 14, the price has gone up by $30, which translates to 43%.

This big jump in battery price may not stem from Apple merely deciding to crank up the prices for hardware or profit-related reasons. Battery replacements used to cost more than what consumers have been paying over the past few years; for the iPhone 6 and newer, replacements used to cost $79. However, in 2017, after it has been confirmed that Apple was throttling old phones, the company drastically cut the cost of battery replacements to $29 due to the so-called Batterygate backlash. This only lasted for a year before the prices were increased to $69. Now, Apple hasn't just gone back to the previous price but has also tacked an additional $20 on top for a total out-of-pocket cost of $99.

If you want to take good care of your battery and not have to replace it sooner than necessary, remember to regularly shut down battery-draining apps, avoid keeping your phone in places with high temperatures, and don't let the battery drain to zero. Similarly, it's advised that you don't charge it all the way to 100%, because that too contributes to poor battery life.