It's official: Smartphones will need to have replaceable batteries by 2027

Mystify0771@kbin.social to Technology@kbin.social – 0 points – It's official: Smartphones will need to have replaceable batteries by 2027
androidauthority.com

Do you miss phones with replaceable batteries? By 2027, you won't anymore because, by law, almost every smartphone will have them again.

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TL;DR

  • The European Council has ended its adoption procedure for rules related to phones with replaceable batteries.
  • By 2027, all phones released in the EU must have a battery the user can easily replace with no tools or expertise.
  • The regulation intends to introduce a circular economy for batteries.

I’ve never owned a smartphone with a removable battery and I don’t feel like I ever needed one.

As a mostly iPhone user, will this mean we go back to phones with plastic bodies?

Replaceable batteries were great. I could keep phones going for years until Samsung started pumping out bloated software updates that slowed them down.

I remember using the Samsung Galaxy S2 which is ancient by today's standards, but one thing I remember distinctly was how super convenient it was to be able to pull the back off and switch out the battery, it reminded me of the simplicity of swapping batteries on a DSLR camera.

Some people mentioned that you'll drop your phone and the battery will just fly out. I don't remember ever having that happen and my S2 had a rough life.

The one part I feel is valid criticism is water resistance, manufacturers will have to actually work on their designs to get IP resistance now. As much as I love waterproof phones, I'd much rather be able to have a spare battery than think about what happens if I drop it in water

of course not. It might mean a slightly thicker phone, but with a bit of smart engineering and a regulatory incentive, I'd expect something quite elegant. Think about how your SIM tray pops out.

good, but i am afraid they will just find another way to artificially shorten the length of a phone life.

They do that already. From my experience with Samsung phones is that after 2 years they start reboot or off sudden, HTC (RIP) sometimes misses some incoming calls.

After we moved from vacuum tubes to transistors, electronics got more robust, but apparently that doesn't apply to smart phones.