The European Union (EU) is set to usher in a new era of smartphones with batteries that consumers can easily replace themselves.
Earlier this week, the European Parliament approved new rules covering the design, production, and recycling of all rechargeable batteries sold within the EU.
[…]For “portable batteries” used in devices such as smartphones, tablets, and cameras, consumers must be able to “easily remove and replace them.” This will require a drastic design rethink by manufacturers, as most phone and tablet makers currently seal the battery away and require specialist tools and knowledge to access and replace them safely.
This should’ve been mandated more than a decade ago, but better late than never. Faulty batteries is one of the primary reasons people eventually upgrade, even when their device is otherwise still perfectly functional. Device owners should be able to easily open their device and replace the battery, and of course, said batteries should not be hindered by patents, trademarks, or any other artificial monopolies – anybody should be able to produce them.
The battery in my 2018 Dell XPS 13 9370 bulged a few years ago, but since the laptop is easily opened, it took me about 5 minutes to replace the faulty battery with a brand new one, and it only cost me about EUR100 – on a laptop that originally cost about EUR2200, I think that’s an amazing deal to keep the machine going. It’s otherwise in tip-top shape, and its 8th Gen i7, 16GB of RAM and 4K display can easily last me another ten years, especially since, as a Linux user, I won’t have to worry about my operating system killing off support.
Smartphones should be the same.
Yeah, I noticed this trend moving to laptops starting with the Apple Brand. The Anti-FRU, epidemic has spread to US manufacturers. Batteries, fans, drives, locked into a sealed unit. This forces extra money out of your pocket for AppleCare, and similar. I remember when there were standards in standardized Batteries( Now almost a dead industry except for DUracell and Energizer) Also on the rechargable front, there was a standard shape for smartphones and Blackberries. Those day s are gone as they’re sealed into the unit and when they buldge to the point that they’re unusable units, you’ll pay i fyour authenticator is an app on them along with your life. .LOL
I always choose phones with replaceable batteries : Nokia N95 -> HTC Evo3D -> LG G3 -> Fairphone 4
It is still possible, you just have to vote with your wallet.
When I complained that Qubes OS doesn’t run on my computer, I was answer to buy a compatible computer with the OS (instead of the other way) so for phone batteries, it just have to be the same.
Kochise,
Voting with one’s wallet only works when the market cooperates with the choices you want, but sometimes it’s not possible to buy a product with all the criteria you want, which means we’re forced to compromise. So even though some people want replacable batteries, it’s probably not going to be the single-most important criteria. Once you apply the first and second most important criteria (such as operating system and application support), there may not be any products that fit the third (ie replaceable batteries).
For me, my personal priority is “openness”, yet despite my intentions I’m often forced to buy products that are closed/proprietary. Voting with one’s wallet goes out the window. For this reason, sometimes mandates like this are the best answer. This is especially true when it comes to things like planned obsolescence, non-upgradability/non-repairability and other perverse incentives.
Honestly, have a look at the fairphones. Long software support, replacement components and open software if that’s what ticks your box. The compromise is it’s a few millimetres thicker and doesn’t have all the fancy features of top end phones like iPhones and Galaxy
Adurbe,
Your recommendation does help, but according to their website they don’t sell to US customers. Do fairphones even work on US carriers? I’m not sure if it’s the same in europe, but phone compatibility can be a problem here in the US. Even if it’s unlocked a phone’s frequencies aren’t always compatible. To make matters worse, since the 5G upgrades, our carriers have actually started blacklisting IME numbers of uncertified “bring your own” phones that are technically compatible but not officially supported.
https://www.kimovil.com/en/frequency-checker/US/fairphone-4
Since we always brought our own devices to the network, this affected most of the phones in our household, including one that was less than a year old. They still connect successfully to the network but are soft-blocked with text messages notifying us to get a supported phone. Officially certified phones that use the exact same frequencies are not blocked. This doesn’t relate to fairphone specifically, but these soft-blocks are an added wrinkle that we have to deal with for many older uncertified phones.
Note that fairphone does not come up in att’s compatible phone selector…
https://www.att.com/device-support/selector
I even tried swapping SIM cards with a working phone, but it was still blocked because the IME wasn’t permitted.
https://www.reddit.com/r/fairphone/comments/q69ipo/using_the_fairphone_4_in_the_united_states/
So until I hear otherwise, it seems that fairphone 4 may be blocked by ATT.
@Alfman : where are your US consumers protection agencies ? Ain’t “the greener the better” a trend in America ? Is there only ATT there ?
Kochise,
If by “greener” you mean more money for companies, then yes it’s certainly a big trend here, haha.
I think you have to concede that user-replaceable batteries are not that high on the list for most smartphone buyers, and that buyers overwhelmingly vote (with their wallets) for the tradeoffs made by all large smartphone providers. Given the very little differentiation that exists among smartphones now (besides the Android / iOS split), it would be very easy for a manufacturer to make a phone that has very easily removable batteries as a key differentiation point. The fact that it doesn’t happen suggests that most phone makers know that users don’t really care about it.
I suspect that, as with many things, some people are going to be very disappointed at the final rules or the impact thereof, with most smartphones hardly changing i.e. the batteries might not be soldered onto the logic board any more, but will still require some tools to replace.
Apple (and I suspect Samsung, Huawei etc) will not suddenly switch to back covers that snap on, but will largely retain the current designs with a few tweaks to satisfy the new regulations.
great ! now our phone will last 10 years but still only have support for 3 ! so phones will still be going strong with a 7 years out of date firmware! but least thebattery life will be good.
but it’s ok because custom firmwares ? nope! locked bootloaders, we can’t have customers making phones software useful on phones we can’t be bothered to update !
leeloo,
+1, I’d love to see this be addressed.
At a minimum, if manufactures are unwilling to provide long term support, then they should be giving owners the build tools they need to support themselves. I don’t find it acceptable that manufacturers have control over our devices AND drop support while keeping control. As owners, we deserve the right to control our own hardware!
Hey, my Libram 5 can finally make / accept phone calls, I compiled Waydroid on it, and it can get updates for years with PureOS ir Debian, etc. Granted it only lasts a few hours on Battery…
Yes, changing batteries should not require a technician degree.
(I am exaggerating of course, ifixit + youtube makes it accessible, but still…)
The recents phones don’t have screws, you have to use special tools to carefully pry them open. Do it hastily, and you could break hinges, and bend the metal covers. Removing the battery itself? It is usually glued on, and excessively fragile: a good combination to get them bend, damaged, or otherwise lose shape, which is a great(!) opportunity to start lithium fires.
Not to mention you would probably lose water resistance. Next time you tip your phone in a cup of tea, it will be toast. (I have lost so many electronics to liquid damage, I don’t think this is an exception anymore).
Anyway, bottom line: I wholeheartedly agree with this decision. My only complaint is it was not soon enough.
This will only lead to an ecological downfall when people return to buying pointless backup batteries just in case. Most battery weardown is anyway due to user error: i.e. always recharging to 100 % which is bad for lithium-based batteries.
sj87,
I don’t get who’s preemptively buying batteries before they need them? Normally people buy new specialty batteries when the old ones stop taking a charge. I’d also note that some users also have *good* reason to have spares, like if they are going to be off grid for a while. Being able to swap in a spare battery is more efficient than the external battery backs which need to be heavier/more powerful to accommodate for the heat and overhead of recharging the phone’s internal battery as opposed to simply swapping it out and having no efficiency losses.
Also, I agree with you about the charging characteristics of lithium batteries, but I don’t think it’s fair to call it “user error”. The blame for this lies squarely upstream for not making it easier to manage batteries properly. I had to go through dozens of apps with root access to find one that worked for my phone. I shouldn’t have to do that and most owners don’t even have the ability to modify their phone behavior using root apps. Even when I had a google pixel phone I had this problem. So to the extent that regular overcharging is a problem, it doesn’t make sense to blame users when it’s clearly the fault of google and other manufacturers who aren’t providing the necessary tools and charging profiles.
Out of curiosity, are there mainstream phones that do a better job of battery charge management? I try to upgrade my phones as infrequently as possible, but it means I’m not on top of their latest features.
Or perhaps we will be able to reuse a battery among different models of phones.
jgfenix,
I don’t believe for a moment that we’ll get industry standards, but that would be so awesome! We really lost something valuable when we stopped using standard batteries. Find that you need more batteries on vacation? No problem, go to any corner store and pick some up. Simple! Now days so many products require their own custom batteries that have to be special ordered. It’s doesn’t need to be this way, but product norms have changed and these days it’s not uncommon for devices to be disposed of when the batteries fail rather than paying a specialist to change the non-serviceable batteries
The cost of having a battery replaced as opposed to buying a replaceable battery and do it yourself is so low that’s almost negligible. Unless it’s an iPhone, but if you buy Apple you’ve already agreed to be overcharged.
It’s also something that’s needed maybe once in the lifespan of a phone, if ever. There are many more ways for a phone to become obsolete than a dead battery.
On the other hand, replaceable batteries will make phones bulkier, heavier, more expensive, and more difficult to water-proof.
emarsk,
Official samsung replacement batteries are $27. I’d say repair shop prices are about 4X that.
https://www.ifixit.com/Kits/Android-Fix-Kits/Samsung-Fix-Kits
Maybe the price won’t put you off, many customers have bad experiences with technology repair shops. They are the auto mechanics of cell phones, haha.
https://www.trustpilot.com/review/ubreakifix.com
A device that’s designed to be user serviceable significantly lowers the price/risk/frustration/wait room time of having to bring your device to the shop or mail it in.
It’s your right to criticize user serviceable batteries, but honestly when this was the norm I don’t recall people complaining about replaceable batteries. Having experienced issues with permanent batteries myself, I for one welcome the return of user replaceable batteries. It could kick start more innovative designs.
If only Android smarpthones were supported for more than 0-1-2-3-4-5 years (depending on the vendor – some cheap fake Android phones from China do not have any updates at all).
PC is a platform which allows to run anything x86 or x86-64 compatible and be happy. ARM is a freak show of kludges and hugely incompatible bespoke implementations. The ISA is the same, everything else is non-standardized.
Linus complained about that a decade ago or so, nothing has changed since then.
https://www.pcworld.com/article/410627/why-linux-pioneer-linus-torvalds-prefers-x86-over-arm.html
Artem S. Tashkinov,
Manufacturer custom operating systems are what killed the standardized hardware environment for ARM. ARM devices are sold with no expectation of implementing standards to support 3rd party operating systems. They’re content with bundling their own software. Bundling can be valuable for the manufacturer as they can make backroom deals to bundle a specific browser, search engines etc, not to mention their own software.
If manufacturers today had their way, x86 would probably look more like ARM with aftermarket operating systems being less viable. So I feel extremely fortunate that IBM PC got grandfathered into being the way it is, not because of anything to do with the qualities of the x86 architecture, but just because of the historical norms and expectations of the x86 platform where it is expected that new hardware upgrades remain backwards compatible with existing software that hardware vendors don’t control themselves This was never the case for mainstream ARM devices, which are almost always bundled with manufacturer custom operating system builds.
Seems like it’s pretty well forgotten that the main reason removable batteries disappeared was to make room for larger batteries. Those removable ones require a thick plastic shell so they don’t get punctured/bent and then promptly catch fire. Now the cellphone/laptop case provides that protection for the battery.
dark2,
Society has been using removable batteries for decades and now suddenly it’s a safety problem? I find this to be a silly argument. To be clear, I’m aware of numerous instances of phone fires, but to the extent these risks are real, they have not been solved by non-removable batteries anyways:
time.com/4485396/samsung-note-7-battery-fire-why/
komonews.com/news/local/girls-iphone-bursts-into-flames-mid-flight-i-thought-we-were-going-down
9to5mac.com/2014/02/03/14yo-schoolgirl-receives-2nd-degree-burns-when-iphone-5c-reportedly-catches-fire-in-her-pocket/
cultofmac.com/291864/iphone-5-catches-fire-mid-flight-causes-emergency-evacuation/
…and the list goes on…
Implying that these risks are unique to removable batteries is an exaggeration to fit an agendas. If anything, these fires provide some evidence that non-removable batteries in our ultrathin devices may not have been sufficiently protected. The extra protection of removable batteries that you are complaining about might actually make them safer. Also, good luck trying to disconnect a non-removable battery! Arguably some of these fires might have gone better with a better protected removable battery designed to accessible by the user.
I’ll grant you that removable batteries do additional space & weight, although ideally we’d have empirical numbers to talk about rather than just handwaiving. I didn’t find clear numbers though.
Those examples are manufacturer defect, not physical damage (which is essentially trying to change the subject to something else). Plus we’re talking about lithium ion batteries specifically, not other types that have been in use for decades. If you puncture your smart phone battery right now, a very energetic fire is virtually guaranteed. Hence the box on my last electronics purchase having batteries with fire on it and warning to ship it via ground only. These batteries are fragile and highly flammable.
dark2,
Firstly battery manufacturing defects are not specific to replaceable batteries (in fact these were all non-replaceable batteries that caught fire). Secondly, with the exception of samsung galaxy 7, these instances were NOT attributed to systematic battery manufacturing defects.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/02/01/newser-iphone-fire/5101833/
If you want to argue that lithium batteries are more dangerous, then go ahead, but removable batteries have more protection as you yourself admitted:
So to whatever extent you want to complain about this extra “thick plastic shell” making the phone bigger or heavier, that’s fair enough. but then you should be conceding the added safety margins that extra protection brings. You can’t have it both ways.
This argument does not hold up dark2. Different devices have user replaceable Pouch Battery Packs. Yes the same battery packs that you find in cellphones and laptops that is not simple user replaceable. Different is
1) a plug and socket so you can unplug the battery.
2) system to hold battery in place that is userfriendly.
https://pine64.com/product/pinebook-and-pinebook-pro-lithium-battery-for-14-version-only-ship-in-us/
This is a user replaceable pouch battery for a laptop. It has no thicker shell. There are differences the 4 screw mount down points built into battery so it does not have to be glued down and the plug that goes into matching socket in the device.
dark2 there is a very big catch. The battery in your phone has designed to be handled by a human. Why quality control. When batteries are being made so many will be handled by humans for testing to make sure production is working right. So all lithium ion batteries have case that is safe for human to handle from the factory where the battery is made.
Now glued into a device with pouch batteries can in fact undermine the pouch properties. Gluing device is simpler in mass production than screws or clip methods..
Yes glued in means if someone attempts to replace the battery they risk tearing the pouch. The pouch it designed to be resistant to being punctured or bent because this can happen to a battery when it random-ally selected for quality control at the factory that makes batteries and they don’t want to have to stop a factory due to fire. Battery glued into phone/laptop in fact undermines the protections against bending and puncturing designed into the pouch of lithium ion batteries. Yes a lithium ion battery is more likely to catch fire after its glued into phone than before it was glued into phone.
Yes the larger battery argument does not hold up either.
Reason for gluing phones cases and batteries is simpler production with less steps.
By the way you know the pouch battery you find in mobile phones those designs were all tested with a forklift driving over them just case they get dropped on floor in factory and other very highly abusive tests before they get to mobile phone. So the batteries in your phone can take a hell of a lot as long as they are not glued to something.
Yes the iphone fires Alfman referred to some of those the cause was defective glue. So gluing a lithium ion battery in increases the risk you will get a phone and it will explode in your hand.
Tremendous idea. All tech products should be designed by lawyers and politicians
There are already government regulations on devices how they have to be designed. You cannot have surface of device to point of burning human by regulation.
Removable batteries does a few things.
1) allows users to keep phones/devices longer.
2) allows phone/device recycling to be simpler and faster due to being able to put the phone electronics in one pile and the batteries in another. Batteries and electronics in most cost effective recycling need two different processes.
3) Government data security electronics phone without battery can be ground up into dust so giving absolute data security.
The fact non removable batteries cause problems with e-waste processing and data security it makes sense that somewhere would do a law like the EU at some point.
There is another good one lets say a bad batch of batteries go out. There is something not covered by this regulation is can the phone run off the charger with the battery removed.
Yes number 4) user safety.
Being able to recall the battery alone if something is wrong means users will be less tempted to keep on using a phone with a defective battery. Also users can inspect the batteries for issues.
Yes there are a lot of reviewers of phones who have kept phones with know bad batteries in them so they can benchmark that time frame and they are not the only ones who have kept the defective phones.
Government regulation on design has it place. Think about it the spacing in your car lights are only what they are due to government regulation that prevent makers having lights at all different spacing because that use to cause crashes. Non user replaceable batteries have been causing problems.
If there was demand for phones with removable batteries then they would be made and sold. Nobody other than a few obsessed lobbyists want this. If the law is passed then people who don’t want removable batteries (i.e almost everyone), and hence a guaranteed sealed device, won’t be able to buy one. Great customer choice decision. Insanely stupid.
Strossen,
it bugs me when people use this logic. It’s not true. If you are lucky, you have enough choices to buy the perfect product. But otherwise, it’s very often the case that we end up making compromises and buying products despite their flaws, not because of them!
“”If there was demand for phones with removable batteries then they would be made and sold. Nobody other than a few obsessed lobbyists want this.””
This is another argument that does not hold. Places where the carrier of telecommunications is responsible for recycling of used phones over 50 of the smart phones in there networks have removable batteries. Yes users get cheaper plan when they buy phone with removable battery in those places. Yes the phones cost more to buy out right up front if you buy them off the plan but having a user removable battery makes them cheaper to recycle because you can drop them in 2 bins one to be shredded into dust on site that is compact and simple to transport..
“”If the law is passed then people who don’t want removable batteries (i.e almost everyone), and hence a guaranteed sealed device, won’t be able to buy one.””
This is not true that people don’t want a removable batteries the reality is they don’t care. They will buy what phone has the buy price.
Being glue together assembly does not equal sealed.
https://www.macrumors.com/2022/02/03/apple-did-not-mislead-about-water-resistance/
Glue together assembly the glue breaks over time so the sealed status goes away. Yes the more costly oring or grease options are better.
The grease system is where you fill like the complete inside of device with Petroleumjelly so there is no room for contamination.
The reason why the glue system breaks down is with the constant minor flexing the glue basically stress fractures.
Now oring and grease are the two resealable. Instead of glued if you are wanting sealed and you want it non reversible it should be welded and in particular ways Of course welding cost too much money, Greasing filling gets messy and orings cost more than glue but less than welding.
User open-able device with a oring you just put a little bit of grease/Petroleumjelly on the oring every time you open it and the rating stays as good as new.
Basically if you want sealed long term you don’t want glued.
Sealed you want to look at medical implants they do not use glued assembly because glued assembly you can never be sure of it remaining sealed.
Yes grease filled, oring, welded and encased are the 4 solutions used for absolute sealed to remain sealed for a long time that medical use.