For the people I know that do upgrade their phones regularly, they typically want to give their old phone to someone who would love a usable phone, but can't afford a new one. Giving a phone with a shot and non-replaceable battery effectively destroys the value of the gift.

I know many people who can't afford to by new, and they avoid buying older or used phones because they fear the battery may be shot.

We obviously have different opinions regarding what most people want... totally fine.

I have experience saying the exact opposite, although this was a few years ago.

OnePlus set up a marketing booth on my campus in 2018 or 2019 or so, and they did exactly this, with a large sign asking people what they want out of a phone. They asked passerbys what they want out of a phone, and they let people put their requests on a board.

When I put my request up, I wasn't the first one to request replaceable batteries and a headphone jack. (At the time, OnePlus had removed the jack from their most recent phone, after advertising their previous phone in comparison to Apple's jackless phone).

I don't love everything the EU does (cookie banners!?) but this is one where I have confidence that the consumer will ultimately benefit.

As others have noted, most people do not replace their phones every two years anymore, there just isn't any big reason to.

People don't change batteries in their phones now because they'd need a heat gun and a soldering iron and they'd have even chances of starting a fire, breaking the phone, or succeeding in changing the battery without prior experience using those tools. A shop could do it reliably, but the shop will charge 100€ because it's time-consuming and error-prone. A 3-5 year old phone is often not worth 100€.

When a battery change costs 25€ and takes 5 minutes, people will do it all the time even if they don't know that today.

This is going to be harder, or, at least, harder to replace your current phone with something objectively better. RAM and Flash shortages / high prices are likely going to last for years, wars are additionally jeopardizing production of electronic components, and the current crop of mobile devices is already insanely powerful. It's going to be pretty hard to sell most people an upgrade that feels meaningful when it's going to be like 30% more expensive.

Running AI locally could be a big selling point for an upgrade, but see the problems with RAM and general production capacity overload. I's not going to be a mass-market thing.

But what if you asked the right question, "what is the biggest problem with your phone?"

Most would answer, "the battery dies too soon. It doesn't last all day like it used to."

Before that, you wrote "One of the most frustrating things about HN is that people seem so unaware of how idiosyncratic their preferences are" and it's exactly what I could say here. Not everyone has lots of money and for some people extending the life of their phones is important. They really do wish they could replace the battery without hassle and without paying a shop to do it.

Possibly true, and equally true of the screen, the charging port, or any other component.

"Repairability" isn't a feature people list unprompted, it's a property they notice the moment a £5 part bricks their phone.

The street-corner survey tells you what people currently notice, not what they'd value if the option existed.

> by the time batteries wear out, most people are going to want a new phone

In a market where batteries are glued in and replacement costs a meaningful fraction of a new device, of course people upgrade on that timeline. Change the cost structure and the behaviour changes with it.

Fair point that we'd want data, but the original claim rests on the same intuition, just pointed the opposite way.

The broader framing (that repairability is an idiosyncratic preference being imposed on a majority who don't want it) gets this backwards. Most people don't want to care about repairability, in the same way most people don't want to care about food safety standards. They want the option to exist without having to think about it. That's what the law provides.

Are you sure about this? I've heard this complaint from a lot of non-tech people who are old enough to remember flip phones with replaceable batteries. It might be age related.

In fact, the only place I would ever expect somebody to claim otherwise is here.

Not true. In recent years smartphones do not advance much, and would be perfectly fine to keep working if not for the dying battery.

> At the very least we'd need to see some data that shows that most people replace batteries when it is possible to do so.

The degree of "possible" varies greatly depending on the available expertise and spare parts. Right now in EU it's cost prohibitive for both coz the special labor required is expensive and almost no official spare parts for consumers. So of coz this will be no data to support your claim.

It’s a pretty commonly used canonical example of revealed preferences.

<proceeds to state opinions contrary to what the overwhelming majority of elected representatives of the people of Europe just expressed>

Were you trying to prove your own point?

Yeah, for someone that changes phone every 3 years or earlier, that's not a desired feature.

But many people did that change precisely because battery got weak, and there have been less and less reasons to keep on the most modern model for a while now.

E.g. most peoples don't really think or ask that their tap water be free of cholera and other harmful substances, and yet we might want to make sure that continues to be the case. So it's not strong argument worth arguing about.

The real argument is - how much a compromise a replaceable vs non-replacable battery is. And I suspect the biggest part of non-replaceable batteries is actually superficial vanity considerations (gee, is it 7mm or 6.5mm), and planed obsolescence making more money. But the technical aspects are still a valid debate.

I don’t understand. If we want to see the data we do need to make batteries replaceable.

What sort of compromise do you envision? I mean, toasters still have a crumb tray on the bottom that open so you can clean them even though no one does. Am I "missing out" on sleek, streamlined toaster designs because manufacturers feel they have to put a door in the bottom?

This regulation is targeted to devices with poor battery lives. Just because it hasn’t occurred to people to ask for the feature doesn’t mean they won’t appreciate it.

Instead this law is designed to provide the public with a good everyone can benefit from - less waste of valuable electronic components polluting our environment.

And even if those same consumers would choose a thinner phone over a replaceable battery, they will probably also enjoy being able to fully charge it more often for less money.

I feel like I will be using this phone until it crumbles to dust. Apple shows no interest in making decently sized phones. I would support the EU enacting legislation to enforce at least one phone in each lineup to be no bigger than 60 mm x 125 mm. (iPhone Mini is ok, but it's still bigger than what I prefer.)

Smaller and lighter phones are an accessibility concern. Miniaturization has been the goal for computers since they were invented. It is incomprehensible that designers and manufacturers are reversing course. My options right now are basically do nothing or replace my phone with a watch.

1. lifestyle

2. software updates

3. battery capacity

While it is hard to change the first, the other two can be influenced by laws. And while the second is rather complex, the third is quite simple. Since the manufacturers have few incentives to produce phones with replaceable batteries, there are very few options on the market to choose from. Most have other major limitations, like slow CPU/GPU, crappy cameras, or else.

So eliminating one factor of unnecessary waste is absolutely a good idea. I just hope it doesn't backfire in some weird way. And I don't say that replaceable batteries don't come at a cost, they do. But that cost is much lower than many assume and not that easy to measure, because currently, you can compare only apples with oranges.

Although some of this depends on how you define replaceable.

Yes, and if you asked every passerby what feature they would like to add to the streets, I think you would be there all day before someone said "I wish there were more accessibility ramps".

Luckily for us, we're not governed by "passerby" people.

That remains to be seen. This could accelerate cultural change around desiring shiny new toy being seen as cool

Why? There have been few new features in recent years and new phones have restrictions not wanted by many. Google is closing the Android ecosystem and making it more proprietary so I'll keep my phone as long as I'm able.

The non-replaceable battery has to be one of the biggest scams ever perpetrated on consumers. It's great that it's about to be broken.

'If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses'....Henry Ford

Nobody cares about repairability....until they are hit hard by it.

Anecdote: Around 5y ago, the lightning connector of my wife's iPhone died after 3y usage.

We brought it to an Apple Store and the official answer was "Sorry, we don't fix that on this model. Here is a 200€ discount on a new one"... The phone was still worth >900€ at the time.

Let's be clear: This kind of commercial practice are unacceptable both ecologically and ethically speaking. It is terrible customer service.

A lot of high end phones (outside Apple) at the time would have their USB-C port fixed in matter of few hours for <100€ in any random "I Fix it" store.

The battery is the exact same shit.

Why? My phone works almost perfectly still three and a half years after I bought it. Except the battery lasts shorter.

If I go to battery health in settings it says:

> Important Battery Message

> Your battery's health is significantly degraded. An Apple Authorised Service Provider can replace the battery to restore full performance and capacity.

> Find Your Service Options

Aside from my current phone, I also have a very old iPod Touch. That old iPod Touch would have been usable still as well, if it wasn’t for the fact that it takes somewhere around 10 minutes of active use until it goes from full charge to zero charge. In other words, unusable for bringing with me anywhere plainly because of the battery.

Replaceable battery would have been great. Both for my iPhone and my iPod Touch. Even if it meant they would have been a bit thicker than they currently are.

Not really. The battery just needs to have a connector rather than soldered, and no other things blocking the battery once the back-case is opened. Realistically, a service shop will do the replacement like how watch-batteries are typically replaced.

I think that law doesn't even go far enough, they should standardize a battery format. When like me you are used to open smartphones and replace batteries you realize how very similar they are all in footprint and could be compatible with each other with very minimal effort. If there were only a couple of standardized formats you could find new batteries in every small shop/airports whatever and easily have spares. Chance is that other electronic devices or toys would also adopt them.

Then I sold it, because I ran out of 64GB space. If I could add an sd card, I would probably use this phone longer, instead of contributing to consumerism and creating more e-waste.

I wish that people would think about sustainability and using their devices for longer rather than chasing “new and shiny” every year Apple releases the “best iPhone we ever made”

> this law will make phones _worse_ for most people

Sometimes we have to acknowledge the externalities of our lifestyle and take things down a notch.

Even if most throw out their old phones, now at least it'll be trivial to shuck these devices to get the battery for recycling, while sending the device for refurb or further recycling.

A key component to effective recycling is separation, and this is one step in that direction

Som even if most people change phone before the battery gets really bad (I doubt that this is really the case), the end result will still be that fewer new phones will be purchased.

Now we just need a law that requires hardware makers unlock their devices when they stop providing updates.

The article (granted, probably not the best source of information) has some numbers like "number of phones sold", but doesn't actually tackle the crux of the issue: how many of those phone sales would be prevented by having user swappable batteries?

I guess I run my iPhone on low battery mode a lot, due to idiosyncratic reasons too. Maybe I do.

Apple battery replacement costs anywhere from $70 (for a ~$400 phone) to $120 (for a ~$1000+ phone). In many global markets you can get a brand new phone for that much.

And no, I don't want a new phone just because the battery wears out, it did not lost the ability to do phone calls and SMS in the process.

We are on the year of Android 17, my oldest device still runs Android 12 perfectly well, with the apps I care about.

Very ironic, you almost got it, post.

Okay, you're claiming two things: (i) replaceable batteries will compromise some other features, and (ii) most people want those features more than they want a replaceable battery.

Can you name 3 of those features? I personally can't.

Hopefully this will help bring the headphone jack back.

Its not enough by itself that the phone has amassed scratches and is 20% slower or has a 30% worse camera optic than the current generation, or that updates will only continue for a year or two more.

But the slowdown (associated with battery degradation btw) and fact that it doesn’t get me through a whole day definitely move the needle into me buying a new phone.

(and yes, I know that power banks exist)

Some products on the market are there to address some inherent need or desire people have; some are for more manufactured needs/desires.

To me the intent of this law looks to put a floor on the environmental cost of providing for the manufactured variants.

At the same time, 5.78 billion people have a smartphone worldwide. It is obviously wildly unsustainable to live in a world where 5.78 billion people have to throw away their old phone and buy a new one every 2-3 years. However, phone manufacturers have figured out that if they force people to, they can amass ridiculous levels of wealth because the demand for new phones would be constantly high. So obviously the incentives here are completely wrong. This has happened before with lightbulbs in the 20th century and is a legitimate form of market failure that needs to be resolved, as it wastes a lot of consumer spending to replace what consumers already had (like the parable of the broken window).

For many years since phone manufacturers started gluing phones together with a consumable part inside, consumers have been denied the ability to replace their battery. Where the option does exist, it's often very inconvenient, difficult, or with a price inflated to be nearly as expensive as buying a new one.

Phones stopped advancing significantly many years ago. Phone manufacturers now re-release practically the same phone with slight CPU and camera improvements, something completely unheard of until relatively recently. Lately the main marketing trend for new phones has been AI, but this is a nonsense trend because most of modern AI runs in the cloud, and very few are actually utilizing any local AI features, so the only "AI" thing about the phone is just a preinstalled ChatGPT-like app you can get on any other phone. So clearly they have run out of things to improve, and things to market around. In a normally functioning market, this would mean phones have become a solved technology and we can stop replacing our phones as often, maybe once every 10 years if you're careful with your phone. But this is not what we see precisely because phone manufacturers have been manufacturing problems that are most easily solved by buying a new phone, which they will push people to do whatever way they can for profit. The phone industry has failed to regulate itself, and so this is why we are seeing a push for this type of regulation.

... the answer would depend on which street corner you asked.

> people seem so unaware of how idiosyncratic their preferences are

Yes, they are. They also tend to state that "most people" agree with them. This is called subjectivity.

Extreme consumer brain coupled with privilege. Billions of people can’t afford a new phone every couple years, they buy things and use them until they are past the point of repair, only buying a replacement when they have no other choice.

Can you honestly even say this year’s new flagships, or any from the last decade, represent meaningful improvement for most people outside the tech bubble and influencer sphere? Smartphones have been “good enough” for a long time.

The phone now has a limited lifespan though because of this prior stupidity where eventually am gonna get into spicy pillow territory. At that point the phone prematurely dies.

We are going into a period where we are throwing away devices with 12mp+ cameras, and processors arguably faster than most desktops. It was arguable when the phones were old and legacy, but at this point the cameras on there are stupidly good.

We need these phones to be repurposed for a second life and actually capture their manufacture energy costs.

Frankly, if Apple allowed old iphones to be used for server usage, it is kind of crazy how efficient per dollar that would be.

I challenge you to give me an example of how this law might result in a phone that is worse for most people.

This law does not require a slide-off phone cover. It does not require a screwed-on backplate. It does not forbid the use of chemical adhesives. It does not stipulate how a phone should or shouldn't be designed.

It basically just requires the manufacturer to offer replacement batteries and to enable the replacement to be done with commercially available tools. I'd wager the overwhelming majority of phones are already compliant, pending availability of a replacement battery from the manufacturer.

I'm quite confident I could replace the battery on my Sony Xperia 1 iii with a heat gun and my basic iFixit toolkit.

If you stood on the street corner and asked every passerby if they want their phone to have a replaceable battery, I don't think you would be there very long before receiving a "yes". I think that's a more honest framing of the question.

> I suppose someone will say that this law is necessary for environmental reasons, regardless of people's preferences. But that's nonsense, because the law doesn't actually require people to replace batteries rather than replacing their phone

How could they replace their batteries if they wanted to, unless the manufacturer makes it possible? The goal is not to force individuals to not replace their phones, but rather to provide that as an option at all, for those who want it.

> At the very least we'd need to see some data that shows that most people replace batteries when it is possible to do so.

At the very least, we'd need only data showing that that number is non-zero. From where did you get the idea that we need to prove "most" people would choose to take advantage of this option?

Invert the situation. If every iPhone in history had a replaceable battery, until 2027 when the newest iPhone did not have a replaceable battery, I think we can all agree that the uproar would be significant.

Most people want new phones because of shit software updates and marketing not because out of necessity.

Just as much, there's a certain HN complaint form that basically goes "any complaint about the crap that sold now is just programmer/civil-rights-fan/etc idiosyncrasy, real people want exactly this crap 'cause markets never lie".

I doubt most people wouldn't even think that this is a thing they can wish for or that this is even within realm of possibility.

It has to be explicitly named as an option - as, I'm afraid, people have forgotten that you can have "nice things".

Also I feel rather uncomfortable every time somebody purports to be representitive of or know that "most people" want.

We have so much experience with scientific method, yet these massive decisions are adhoc, that's how the whole world works. We never tested what would happen by allowing mass production of plastic, or phones, or whatever, so these antipatches are going by the "feels" as well, with no individual taking responsibility for failures.

However, these preferences don't really matter anyway because nobody is forced to replace the battery and not buy a new phone when their phone has replaceable batteries.

Welcome to democracy and lawmaking in 2026. We know better than you!

What's next, having TV remote controls with non-removable rechargeable batteries, for the "convenience"?! Gimme a break. I love tech progress, but leave your hands off my removable batteries! And my 3.5mm audio jack, now that I think about it! :-)

Least self-aware HN user out there.

Do you really think the European commission got lobbied hard by HN folks?

This law will make phones better for most people, who would rather keep their phone for a decade rather than having to every three years buy a new phone optimized for some vanity metric that looks good on Engadget reviews.

Not my experience at all. The (few) non-tech people I've talked to about phones soon getting batteries again like it. People believe the idea that non-removable batteries are a conspiracy by the phone companies to sell you more phones the same way cartels manipulated the lightbulb market (Phoebus cartel).

But I don’t think this is the case with phone batteries. I’ve had many conversations with friends and family that came down to replace the battery or upgrade the phone.

I feel the same way about soldered on CPUs, RAM and SSDs in laptops and other computers. The benefits of doing this are marginal at best. We all know the real reason is forced obsolescence.

We all know this is why battery replacement is hard too.