Challenge: What is the most expensive everyday device with NON-REPLACEABLE BATTERIES installed (so you have to buy a replacement)?

However, would you say an EV to be the ‘most expensive’? Gets used every day (usually). Battery decreases over time. It’s a very heavy, unsafe, job to change the battery without the appropriate skills and tools and costs as much as a new car does..
(No offence to EV enthusiasts..):joy::rofl:

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Focusing on iPhones is a furphy. Mobile phones of all ‘persuasions’ have soldered in non-replaceable batteries excepting for the businesses with the tools and talents. Why? Consumers seemingly demand svelte thin mobiles and that requires thin flat batteries without bulky contacts.

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It remains to be seen whether even that requirement is lawful or unlawful under forthcoming EU phone battery regulations.

However the internet says that the EU allows a phone to be exempt

if the device maintains 80% capacity after 1,000 recharge cycles

and that

iPhone 15 and above meet that requirement.

Apple allows you to buy or rent parts / equipment for this and other jobs, apparently, but also requires you to enter the IMEI? SN?, which means that they gatekeep the “right to repair”.

In some cases (e.g. a relatively dead phone) you may not be able to get the IMEI / SN from the device itself i.e. if you didn’t previously make a record. The IMEI and SN are printed on the box but not everyone keeps the box.

My recent experience was with a 12 where removing the battery was basically impossible without damaging the battery (a hazardous thing to do!) but maybe the battery itself was faulty.

Opening up a device may compromise water-resistance - as the OP (you) noted in respect of a toothbrush but the same applies to a phone.

So there’s a complex interplay between regulation, design and corporate greed. :wink:

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I will leave it to the OP to clarify what the intended rules for this topic are. :wink:

I don’t own an EV and hence have never tried to replace the batteries of an EV when they reach the end of their usable life. So I can’t comment on the practicality of that process.


Perhaps the ideal would be a battery that can cycle endlessly without degradation. So that the battery is not a point of failure in this way and battery degradation is not the limiting factor for the life of the device. Does this break any law of physics? Is this fantasy? I don’t know.

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Apple AirPods (all variants) have non-replaceable batteries as do all other ear buds I have come across. These can cost around $300 and last around 2 years of medium use then throw them away.

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Most hearing aids now have non-replaceable rechargeables. $1,000 up, and up. But for the challenge are they ‘commonly used’?

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For anyone with significant hearing loss or condition - very common.
Possibly also more common than BEV’s?
Replacing the built in lithium batteries in either - you will need to do without for a period of time. YMMV

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Hearing aids for me, not everyday I suppose “unless you use them” (as above) but damn! they would outstrip just about anything else if you replaced just due to battery demise. Thankfully my chosen brand has a fixed repair price (incl battery replacement) & the battery is on the MB; so you “can” get the battery & electronics replaced for 1/10+ of the price of the devices “if” you do it before they are out of support completely…

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Both hearing aids and earbuds are so ubiquitious (@MickJF) that they qualify as everyday devices. :slight_smile:

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Smart watch batteries. Some brands/models the battery can’t be replaced. Other brands if battery can be replaced, the cost if often close to the price of a new watch.

Not overly good, when batteries run out of puff after a few years.

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