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To remove the battery from your current iPhone, you have to stretch the adhesive that glues it to the device's frame until it releases. Now do this several times. If the adhesive breaks while you stretch it, you'll have to pry it off using heat and scrape the adhesive off. It's not a user-friendly process. But Apple's new iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus employ a new adhesive technology that might make the battery replacement process easier.
With the new adhesive, you can run a low-voltage electrical current through it—something you can do with any portable battery pack and the equivalent of jumper cables for phones. This jolt of electricity “debonds” the tape, enabling the battery to immediately release itself from the frame. Apple says this process is “faster and safer” for smartphone repairs. And while the change should make battery swaps easier for owners of the iPhone 16 and 16 Plus, the new adhesive is unfortunately not utilized in the pricier iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max.
Battery Aid
Why bother replacing a battery? If your phone is starting to have trouble getting through a whole day without a top-up, but is otherwise working fine, swapping in a new battery is cheaper than shelling out for a new phone. It's also more sustainable—you won't be sending off your device to the landfill, thereby reducing the need to manufacture a new device and mine more lithium for the battery.
The new adhesive technology Apple is using in the iPhone 16 may come from the German company Tesa, the European equivalent of 3M. Tesa demonstrated a “debond-on-demand” adhesive on its website some time ago, but the company declined to comment about whether Apple was using its method due to “customer confidentiality.”
The good news is regardless of who makes the product, Apple confirmed that this technology is not exclusive to Apple devices. That means it's likely we'll see it in other smartphones. Customers who order battery replacements for the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus will receive this new adhesive as well for the reinstallation. A service manual that goes over the process will be available on September 20, the day the devices officially go on sale.
The stretch-release adhesive Apple has been using up until now is also a debond-on-demand technology, according to Kyle Wiens, the CEO of the company iFixit. “The problem is that it's inconsistent and gets more brittle over time. It really just doesn't work well on a phone that's been around long enough to need a battery replacement.” Wiens and the iFixit team will soon be testing Apple's new adhesive and, as it has done so for several years, will rate the overall repairability of the device with a score to be published by the weekend.
While Apple's design change has made the battery easier to replace, it hasn't made opening up the phone any easier. You still need a specific tool, which you can rent from Apple's Self Service Repair website or buy from the bevy of tools iFixit sells alongside its repair guides. It's still not anywhere near the level of simplicity from the early days of the smartphone, where you could pop off the back and swap a battery in seconds.
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Wiens highlights HMD's new phone, the Skyline, as an exemplar of repairability. The Skyline has one screw with a camshaft that you twist to get at the insides, making the entire phone much easier to disassemble for screen and battery replacements. “That's the innovation I would like to see out of Apple.” You might point out, as I did, that the Skyline has an IP54 water resistance rating, meaning it's not as protective to the elements as the IP68 rating on the iPhone 16. However, Wiens says this is a little bit of a red herring when talking about repairability.
“The phone isn't really waterproof after you've had it for a few months," he says. “If it genuinely was waterproof that long then the warranty would include the waterproofing, but it doesn't.”
Battery Compliance
Apple isn't making its batteries easier to replace out of the goodness of its heart. The European Union passed regulations last year that require smartphones and tablets to either have batteries that can last longer (retain 83 percent of their capacity after 500 charge cycles and 80 percent after 1,000 cycles) or offer an easier way for device owners to replace those batteries using common tools. Batteries in general need to be easier to replace for technicians too.
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This only affects new smartphones launching in the EU after June 2025, which means the iPhone 16 does not have to adhere to this law. The regulation doesn't just touch on batteries though. Manufacturers need to sell critical spare parts for seven years and offer at least five years of software updates. These laws often influence other regions, which is why Apple is likely testing this battery replacement process in its latest phone. It's unclear whether the new adhesive would be fully compliant with the EU's regulations.
“[The legislation won't require Apple] to completely change the design of the product," says Ugo Vallauri, codirector of the Restart Project and a founding member of the Right to Repair Europe coalition. “As long as they can supply the spare part as well as the tools needed to perform the repair, and it can be performed by a generalist—someone with some level of competence—they would not need to change much further, which can be potentially be seen as a weakness of the legislation. We will see what happens in that respect.”
Matching Game
But easier battery replacements are just one part of the story. Apple is notorious for “parts pairing,” the policy where it uses software to identify and approve parts. Apple will disable certain features if it finds the part wasn't sourced from Apple's official channels—even if the part comes directly from another iPhone. For example, as iFixit's website says, if you replace your iPhone's screen with a genuine but secondhand part, your device will lose access to Apple's True Tone and autobrightness features, even though the screen will otherwise function normally. You may also see warning messages for replaced parts that Apple cannot identify.
New laws in Oregon and Colorado prohibit the practice of parts pairing to discriminate against otherwise compatible parts, and Apple earlier this year said it would expand repair options to support used genuine parts starting this fall. That now applies to the Face ID sensor in the TrueDepth selfie camera—you can now swap this component from one unit to another without compromising security, safety, and privacy, according to Apple.
Apple also says that now, if you use a third-party part that isn't available in its cloud-based calibration servers, the phone will try to activate the part and make it work to its full capability. It will also show the repair history of the device within Settings and list which parts have been replaced. Any used Apple parts will now be able to be calibrated after you install them, and these will appear as “used” parts in the device's repair history. That means features like True Tone will finally be enabled for third-party displays, and you'll be able to see health data for third-party batteries. The front camera and lidar scanner will also stay operational if the module is replaced.
“I've always felt like the goal of right to repair is to create the incentive for these manufacturers, who are the ones good at making stuff, to prioritize or at least incorporate repairability into their objectives,” says Nathan Proctor, senior director of the Campaign for the Right to Repair at Public Interest Research Group. “And once they do, they are actually coming up with new ways to make things easier to fix in ways I couldn't have predicted or thought up. It's exciting to see Apple engineers coming up with solutions for making things more fixable.”
Lock Step
But there's a new concern on the horizon with iOS 18 rolling out to Apple devices: Activation Lock. You might be familiar with this if you have erased an iPhone in the past but forgot to remove your Apple account details, essentially locking a new owner out from the device unless they have your password. In iOS 18, this Activation Lock feature now extends to iPhone parts. The idea is that this will deter thieves from stealing iPhones to sell parts. If the iPhone detects that a used part has been installed, it will ask for the original part owner's Apple account password.
Proctor says the number one complaint he's heard from device refurbishers is around Activation Lock—these companies have devices legally acquired from donations or recycling programs, but they cannot do anything to unlock the phone. (Apple has ways to bypass Activation Lock if you have proof of purchase documentation.)
“We need a way to verifiably say this is not a stolen part,” Proctor says. “I really respect and appreciate and understand the value of the way Activation Lock thwarts theft, but there's got to be some middle ground where a reputable recycler doesn't have to shred working parts and working phones. It's ridiculous. It has the potential to undermine any environmental gains from all the other stuff that they're doing.”
