Apple has the lowest grades in laptop, phone repairability analysis

The MacBook Neo is a step in the right direction, though.

See full article...

 

[frankielc]

Lenovo and Lenovo Thinkpad are different things...
Lenovo Thinkpad gets 10/10 from iFixit!

 

[therealknewman]

Interesting. I attended an executive briefing event at Lenovo's NC campus a few weeks ago, they were very excited to tout their efforts on the repairability front. They specifically called out Framework as the only manufacturer offering better repairability. The only manufacturer I'm aware of that allows one to easily replace the USB-C port aside from Framework is Lenovo with their latest models.

 

[Me Myself And I1]

Apple devices may be hard to repair but they're designed so they don't have to be and they last.

I owned a lot of Apple devices since 2000 and the ONLY TWO times I needed repair was a speaker replacement on a pre unibody Intel Macbook Pro and a motherboard on the tangerine iBook. Both repaired under waranty.

That's it.

It was always a long ownership - 5-10 years. The said iBook... for 20. It was still working and was regularly used for 17 years. I sold it to a collector. I still have 2 iPods Classic - both work.

I know, it's just my personal experience. But it's a long-term experience of ownership. I bought Apple devices (inncluding laptops and desktops) in 4 different countries. So it's a very good sample.

 

[krhodes1]

This article really makes no sense. You can easily find repair manuals and order official components on Lenovo's website. ThinkPads are about the most repairable laptops out there, as far as system-on-chip designs are concerned.

Thinkpads are not the only laptops Lenovo makes. Their big business class and workstation laptops that are designed for upgradability are easy, the various "thin and light" models definitely are NOT as easy. This whole article paints with a too broad brush other than Apple - because all of their stuff is absolutely miserable to take apart to slightly greater and lesser extents.

 

[Systema Encephale]

How is it Framework, know for their repairtability and user upgrade-ability not on there ? Then we have Tuxedo not on there wither ? wtf sort of list is this ? those where the two I had been considering.

It is an American study and they looked at the eight most popular laptop brands in the USA. Specifically they picked the top eight brands from Statista's "Laptop ownership by brand in the U.S. as of September 2025", and neither Framework nor Tuxed are on that list. Looking at that Statista chart I think we can also see why they went with the top eight rather than top ten or more: Below the top eight, ownership per brand is under 5 percent. The least popular brand on that list is Huawei with 1 percent on rank 11, hence Framework and Tuxedo will be below 1 percent.

 

[Systema Encephale]

That's a different metric. If it costs a million dollars to get a replacement battery, but you can easily pop the old one out and new one in, you'll have an A+ repairability score. If the battery costs $5 but you need a spudger and a special driver bit to open it, you get a C-. This is why this is useless information.

The French scoring system used in the study does factor in affordability of parts; it is one of the five factors for the overall score. Assuming an idealized device that is generally perfect but has that million dollar battery, it would likely score zero points in parts affordability and the maximum 20 points in every other category. The final score is the sum of factors divided by ten, hence the device would get 8 out of 10 points in total, a 20% penalty for the battery. Arguably too little for an absurd million dollar battery, but this is unlikely to happen in the real world. I do not know what parts affordability score the iPad gets.

 

[Carewolf]

This may be of questionable value. ThinkPads are more repairable than most when you compare like-for-like models.

Must be non-ThinkPad Lenovo models measured. ThinkPads are the only laptops that come with full instructions how to disassemble and all spare parts available.

 

[LtLoLz]

I have some private and work experience using and repairing Hinge Problems Elitebooks and Probooks and Lenovo Thinkpads and Ideapads. Both Thinkpads and Elitebooks have part numbers and instructions for repair in manuals. Both are also transitioning to soldered RAM for cost reduction, speed increase and more thinness. No glued batteries in any of them. Lenovo does love their parts whitelists however.

The Huge Problems x360 Elitebooks and Probooks are an exception. A plethora of design issues that make them self destruct expensively.

Lenovo Yoga have proprietary side power buttons soldered to the motherboards. Can't get new ones and they die after 1 year, just out of warranty.You have to replace the motherboard that's otherwise fine or get a new laptop.

As soon as you go to the lower models, it's just atrocius.

 

[eikomagami]

Interesting. I attended an executive briefing event at Lenovo's NC campus a few weeks ago, they were very excited to tout their efforts on the repairability front. They specifically called out Framework as the only manufacturer offering better repairability. The only manufacturer I'm aware of that allows one to easily replace the USB-C port aside from Framework is Lenovo with their latest models.

Some of the newer dell pro / pro plus have replaceable usb-c ports. probably cheaper than replacing the whole system board every time the dodgy soldering fails. have a few hundred at work and thats the most common failure i see.

 

[Erbium168]

This article really makes no sense. You can easily find repair manuals and order official components on Lenovo's website. ThinkPads are about the most repairable laptops out there, as far as system-on-chip designs are concerned.

I start to wonder if the criterion was that they had to be in French.

 

[Erbium168]

Canon copiers ate Xerox's lunch because although the Xerox was highly repairable, the Canon never broke in the first place.

I spent some years as part of a consultancy in that area.
Canon won because they had the highest trained sales staff who were focussed on converting the finance people, not the IT department and the users, and because their contracts were...well, better not go into that. But also, they understood the changing office job mix.

Part of Xerox's problem was the changing nature of office printing. Once users started printing their own jobs directly, the usage became much more intermittent. Canon and Minolta recognised this with engines with a high peak speed but much lower sustained speed. Xerox had focussed on moderate sustained speed based on large jobs often running 24 hours a day. This was part of the logic behind the wax printers which are very wasteful if switched on and off, but not if, say, you are running a print run of 2000 full color A3 sheets.

I saw this demonstrated in Xerox's lab and we were able to replicate it in our own. Put a thousand sheet book through the Xerox printer and it chugged away steadily. The competition started out much faster but then slowed down, and the Xerox printer finished before the other one got half way. But how many people print large books on an office printer, outside publishers?

So Canon won because they understood the users better.

 

[Erbium168]

Lenovo Yoga have proprietary side power buttons soldered to the motherboards. Can't get new ones and they die after 1 year, just out of warranty.

A non-commercial fix for this is to replace the power button with a very small reed switch. You can then operate it with a small external magnet, perhaps on a keychain.
Power switch failures were common on a lot of laptops in the past, it was a relatively simple fix with the advantage, in the distant days of early Windows before security, that the casual naughty person couldn't work out how to turn them on.

 

[uberjannie]

Somebody here has to make sure what laptop they are testing. Sure, all laptops should be repairable, but at work we have ThinkPads and if anything is wrong, a technician from a company comes fixing it, be it speakers, wireless cards, screens, keyboards etc. So I am pretty sure ThinkPads are very repairable, but that the consumer laptops might be far less so, I have no doubt about.

 

[bobmon]

This may be of questionable value. ThinkPads are more repairable than most when you compare like-for-like models.

My guess is that this rating is due to the non-Thinkpad Lenovo laptops --- I've had one Ideapad and was unfavorably impressed. Looked briefly at the Legions and didn't like what I saw, don't even recognize the "LOQ" line. On the other hand, between my wife and me we have 5 working Thinkpads (4 currently powered on); every one has been opened and serviced/upgraded more than once, and I love 'em.

 

[GeorgieP]

Lenovo's consumer grade products must be especially terrible for them to average out that badly, considering that ThinkPads are generally more repairable than anything other than a Framework.

they are, they're absolute dogshit. I've burned a few friends by recommending them, because I'm very fond of high-end Thinkpads, and I assumed they would share some of the good qualities. They do not.

 

[photovirus]

I think it's downright misleading to name the report as “Grading companies on the fixability of their products” if you throw in legislation activity and publishing score docs in the mix.

 

[NopeNopeNope]

This may be of questionable value. ThinkPads are more repairable than most when you compare like-for-like models.

They're nothing like thinkpads of even a decade ago.

They keyboard used to be on a tray - push forward in the small dips at the front, 4 screws, lift, clip out the ribbon and put a new one in, no need to open the main case. At that time we didn't even order different laptops for the team in Germany, we just ordered a DE keyboard instead and swapped.

They used to have drain holes for liquid on the keyboard.

You used to be able to peel off the screen surround, unscrew 4 screws, unclip the eDP connector and swap inside 10 mins. Now the whole top half of the laptop is a glued, sealed unit costing almost the same as an entire new laptop and needs near full disassembly and messing with the hinges.

 

[drfisheye]

I was amazed and pleased. I was flying with a Dell laptop and always having to remember to charge a replacement battery to swap to make it the entire flight, except that I frequently forgot.

Then Apple was able to offer increased battery life within the same packaging size by going non-replacable, so I switching to a MacBook Pro and never failed to make the entire flight. Was awesome.

With replaceable they mean it can be replaced with a screwdriver instead of trying to unglue or unsoldering the battery. The batteries in my higher end consumer Dell and HP laptops are easy enough to replace with the right screwdrivers. I don't think that lowers the capacity of the battery compared to glued batteries.

 

[TheOldChevy]

I fully agree with the repairability concern (even if I am not fully in line with the criteria indicated here) but I think it should always be listed alongside reliability evaluation.

The other concern that could be interesting is evolution-ability, but I am afraid all current portable devices (and most non-portable) will get very bad notation.

 

[drfisheye]

I'll take reliability over repairability.

Why not both? User error can occur anytime.

 

[iceice1972]

So, this is category of statistical crimes that happens a lot in tech. 'Which product is most repairable' doesn't tell the consumer anything of value, because it doesn't tell us which is most likely to break in the first place - it just assumes they're all equally likely to break. And this is part of the job of actuaries who need to address warranty liability. Is it better to seal the laptop such that it's 3x harder to open if it makes it 3x less likely to need to be opened? From a cost standpoint those might balance out, but from a customer satisfaction standpoint - would you rather your device be easy to repair or not break in the first place? Almost every one would choose the latter.

I think a lot of the 'repairable' narrative is really a byproduct of 'how easy is it to upgrade', which is an entirely different animal. If a device has upgradable RAM, than making it easy to open and access components is the correct customer satisfaction outcome. But if it doesn't have any upgradable components, then making it so you never need to open and access components is the correct customer satisfaction outcome. Apple's design goal is to make products that are as close to an inert solid object as possible - as few mechanical connectors as possible, as few mechanical components as possible, devices that when dropped may fail due to material failure, but not due to mechanical failure. Your RAM will never come loose, your HD will never crash.

Apple hardware typically has a 3 year longer lifespan than Windows hardware based on industry surveys, which matches Apple's 'active device' vs sales reporting. You would think that Apple's terrible repairability scores would lead to the opposite outcome - that the device breaks, is too hard to repair and gets binned, and yet all studies I've ever seen suggest the opposite, that they last substantially longer (almost twice as long) despite that. So, what does the repairability score actually tell consumers? Does it tell us that the less repairable something is, the longer it's likely to last? Well, no. That's a trivial case to test. So what use is this information without the 'how likely to break' information?

And it also doesn't answer the question of 'what product will allow me, a hobbyist, to repair and maintain the longest', because it doesn't answer any of the questions of component availability, future software support and so on. It's closer to that, but it's still not that. My grandfather was a big Heathkit supporter. He assembled his color TV, and he had the schematics and a catalogue where he could order replacement components if they failed. That was serviceable. Will ASUS ship you a new DSL6540 if your thunderbolt controller fails? Will Intel continue to produce it? Is there a large enough market for that for someone like Mouser to keep in inventory (they don't btw).

I'm guessing that 3 year lifespan difference between Windows and Macs includes $250 black friday junk for Windows. In 4 decades of Windows hardware use, I have had two things go bad - a power supply in a home built desktop PC and a NIC port on that same system (home file server.) Every other Windows machine I had I eventually disassemble and recycle only because the hardware isn't supported, and even then it was hard to let go becauae there was nothing wrong with the hardware itself.

If you compared Windows hardware with similar costs to Apple hardware, I expect the results would be much closer.

 

[CommanderZulu]

EU should adopt and standardize the French requirements. It's incredible challenging to maintain a variety of documentation requirements across all those languages and countries. Having a uniform disclosure requirement in the EU means that companies can just post it once (and machine-translated to all languages) without dealing with additional complexity. Same with product labelling requirements.

 

[getsir]

One should also take into account the hardware and software support life, reliability and quality of the device into these scores.
I rather have a device that is a bit of a pain to repair but rarely ever would need to repair it in its life time than having a device that's very repair friendly but breaks with in a year!
Pressure on OEM to continue to improve their devices to make them more repairable is always good thing but one should not forget to credit OEM investing in building highly reliable and durable devices in the first place. Most users will never attempt a repair, hence the biggest benefit would be to make the device last as long as possible before any component fails.

 

[stdaro]

Apple devices may be hard to repair but they're designed so they don't have to be and they last.

I say, give me one or the other. Apple makes, in my experience, reliable hardware, so I will forgive them some of their repairability deficits.
but plenty of their competitors ship shit that breaks and isn't repairable. its been a while, but I had a long run of bad luck with power input connectors and DC input electronics. mostly HP/Compaq, but I had a series of corporate laptops with perfectly good screens and systems, but wouldnt charge anymore, and the DC power stuff was not repairable with desoldering and resoldering, so those just ended up in the corporate e-waste stream.

 

[HydraShok]

Was a Lenovo shop now slowly phasing into HP. The only annoyance is the RAM upgradable feature that has become more of a Dodo bird extinction for enterprise fleet models. Only thing salvageable will be the nvme and nothing else. Everything is minimalized to reduce weight and increase space savings for portability. Requires a specialty shop with a microscope for soldering for the minuscule problems. Couple YT channels that feature their specialties on the mainboard itself with their microscopes and solder irons and heat guns.

Lenovo started doing that, but has actually gone back to dual DIMMs in recent generations after years of soldered-only or soldered plus one DIMM slot. The current generations of ThinkPad T-series are quite easily repairable/upgradable for stuff that would have been impossible or factory only just a few years ago. Don't get me wrong, there's still factory only repairs, but it's a lot better than it was 5 years ago.

 

[jf1450]

I've built my own computers since the 80's, worked in IT over 30 years after retiring from the Army. IOW, I know my way around technology.

I've got a 2021 vintage MacBook Pro just gathering dust because somebody (not me and not my laptop) spilled a cup of chocolate milk on it. Other than the sticking gooey keyboard it works just fine. I've looked at documentation, watched Youtube videos until I'm blue in the face and decided that there's just no way am I going to tackle taking that thing apart to fix it.

 

[Ciconia]

The lack of a list of which models they based their scores on deserves an arbitrary grade of D-. Not all model lines are created equal. Not to excuse any manufactures, but this is all a tradeoff. Batteries are a consumable component and replacing the battery or installing a higher capacity battery would be nice. At the same time, now that I use phones without replaceable batteries, I don't have to worry about dropping my phone and having the battery fly out.

That remind me, they should also add a score for ability to use a phone without a case. I strongly dislike having to use a case because the actual phone case is too fragile or too uncomfortable to hold.

 

[BobbyBobberson]

Why not both? User error can occur anytime.

There seems to be a sliding scale between the two.

 

[g5rdpew8]

All these articles are too focused on hardware. If you buy a Lenovo do you get free Windows upgrades (not bug fixes) for seven years? Do you get the Office suite for free? If you buy the Neo you get MacOS upgrades for free and and office suite.

 

[NopeNopeNope]

All these articles are too focused on hardware. If you buy a Lenovo do you get free Windows upgrades (not bug fixes) for seven years? Do you get the Office suite for free? If you buy the Neo you get MacOS upgrades for free and and office suite.

I've lenovo devices that came with Windows 7, got upgrades to 8, 8.1, 10 and 11.

I've a Mac from around the same time (MacBook Air intel) that is now dead to them.

That lenovo will likely get Win 12 too. Maybe 13 after. You can run Win 11 on some ancient kit, MS recommend you don't as the security is better on recent CPUs (that goes for apple too).

As for the office suite - nobody cares about it on Mac, people just use (Microsoft) office online or install it if somebody else pays.

Pointless argument. But you were wrong on the internet, so I had to correct you.

 

[NopeNopeNope]

Lenovo and Lenovo Thinkpad are different things...
Lenovo Thinkpad gets 10/10 from iFixit!

Lenovo Thinkpad. Singular. One model. Admittedly a new model where they worked to make it repairable, let's hope it catches on.

 

[ranthog]

Apple devices may be hard to repair but they're designed so they don't have to be and they last.

I owned a lot of Apple devices since 2000 and the ONLY TWO times I needed repair was a speaker replacement on a pre unibody Intel Macbook Pro and a motherboard on the tangerine iBook. Both repaired under waranty.

That's it.

It was always a long ownership - 5-10 years. The said iBook... for 20. It was still working and was regularly used for 17 years. I sold it to a collector. I still have 2 iPods Classic - both work.

I know, it's just my personal experience. But it's a long-term experience of ownership. I bought Apple devices (inncluding laptops and desktops) in 4 different countries. So it's a very good sample.

Counter point: Lithium Ion Batteries

The one thing guaranteed to limit the life span of any device. The one thing with a fixed lifespan you have to replace.

I'd like to point out that with modern devices both Lenovo and HP have very similar reliability. Unless it is abused, modern equipment just tends to last. I would never recommend someone spend money on extended warranties.

I get to see this at work with how often things actually break, and for the average user the limit to the hardware is usually software bloat slowing things down or Windows dropping support for the hardware.

However, every device has to have its battery replaced. Likely around 3 years depending on how often you're cycling the battery. With my Lenovo it was pretty easy and straight forward with my ThinkPad, even for an internal battery.

 

[Steven N]

I've built my own computers since the 80's, worked in IT over 30 years after retiring from the Army. IOW, I know my way around technology.

I've got a 2021 vintage MacBook Pro just gathering dust because somebody (not me and not my laptop) spilled a cup of chocolate milk on it. Other than the sticking gooey keyboard it works just fine. I've looked at documentation, watched Youtube videos until I'm blue in the face and decided that there's just no way am I going to tackle taking that thing apart to fix it.

I took a quick look at some photos of 2021 Macbooks Pro's and it seems the backplate is removable. So in your case, I would remove the backplate, try to disconnect the battery, wait for a few days to let other components discharge and then put it under the hottest tap water you can bear with your bare skin and rinse the keyboard thoroughly.

Then let the machine dry for a few days or a week in the sun or above a heater, regularly changing positions so the water cannot remain in one spot.
Chances are big that it would work properly afterwards.

(Souce: had a Dell laptop showered with cola that Dell didn't want repair with good reasons that went through this treatment and used it for years afterwards)

 

[ranthog]

The one thing that I question here about the methodology is that they don't seem to be choosing a representative section of each manufacturer's current products. Especially if you only choose 6 products when that can't even get you a single choice from each of a manufacture's product lines.

Then add in to the problem of under sampling, the fact that they only sample the most recently released products which could further narrow down which product lines are being looked into.

Then you have a significant oversampling when it comes to Apple where they probably sampled all the laptops Apple was currently selling.



I would guess this is part of why Lenovo ranked so poorly despite a lot of their product lines being extremely easy to work on. Especially since the Macbook Neo wouldn't have been included in this report.

 

[Tech-Space-Cars]

Replacement parts should be brand/origin agnostic and not require software blessing to operate.

 

[tipoo]

I wonder if the redesigned OLED Macbook Pro will take on any of the repairability improvements from the Neo, or if that's a one of BECAUSE it's cheaper.

 

[Avi Sawyer]

Odd methodology.
iFixIt rates the newest thinkpad as 10/10.

I don't think they graded all Thinkpads, I think they graded more consumer devices such as Thinkbooks and the Yogas too

That would bring the score down

 

[ZippyPeanut]

"Apple leads the list of laptop repairability losers...."

No way!

 

[ranthog]

I don't think they graded all Thinkpads, I think they graded more consumer devices such as Thinkbooks and the Yogas too

That would bring the score down

Based on the methodology they only graded the 6 most recently released models. I would guess they likely could have significantly different product mixes each time they do this grading.

 

[anon georgetown]

I've built my own computers since the 80's, worked in IT over 30 years after retiring from the Army. IOW, I know my way around technology.

I've got a 2021 vintage MacBook Pro just gathering dust because somebody (not me and not my laptop) spilled a cup of chocolate milk on it. Other than the sticking gooey keyboard it works just fine. I've looked at documentation, watched Youtube videos until I'm blue in the face and decided that there's just no way am I going to tackle taking that thing apart to fix it.

alcohol and compressed air