Right to Repair is a grassroots movement with an inspiring vision: to reduce the environmental impact of technology and empower consumers, by making repairs more affordable and accessible.
At some point in every phone’s life, something will go wrong with the hardware, whether that’s an accidental drop or just an ageing battery. That gives you a frustrating dilemma: repair the phone, or just get a new one?
The more repairs cost, the harder it is to justify keeping an old phone running. On the other hand, buying a new phone has big implications for the environment – and your wallet.
But when consumers have access to replacement parts and affordable repairs, they can keep old devices working instead of buying a new one when something inevitably breaks. That’s what Right to Repair hopes to achieve.
Read on to learn how the Right to Repair movement is fighting for independent repair options – and what that means for your iPhone and the planet.
What is the Right To Repair?
The Right to Repair is a consumer rights movement and set of principles advocating for the right of device owners (that’s you!) to choose who repairs their devices and what repair parts to use.
You might be thinking “I own my iPhone – I can do what I want with it.” But companies like Apple have ways to make independent repairs impractical or even impossible:
- Software locks: Technological protection measures (TPMs), or digital locks, are used to block third-party access to a piece of hardware and prevent installation of aftermarket parts.
One of Apple’s most notorious TPMs is its exclusive hold on Face ID and its predecessor, Touch ID. If the front camera (or Home Button on older models) is replaced by anyone but Apple, these authentication features simply do not work.
- Hardware supply control: The manufacturer (in this case, Apple) controls the supply of parts.This keeps the cost of parts and repair artificially high. .
These strategies mean that even though you own your device, you have to use and repair it on the manufacturer’s terms. Seems unfair, right? The Right to Repair movement wants to change things.
This movement aims to make products last longer by advocating for consumers to be able to make their own repairs, and/or choose third-party repair technicians. This article talks smartphones, but the Right to Repair movement also extends to cars, farm equipment and even military technology. Major goals include:
- Requiring manufacturers to provide access to spare parts, tools, and manuals.
- Preventing software locks or digital restrictions that hinder independent repairs.
- Reducing electronic waste by extending product lifespans.
- Fostering competition in the repair industry to lower costs for consumers.
There’s increasing recognition by the public and governments that Right to Repair fosters competition, protects consumers and keeps our Earth greener.
Why it matters: the environmental impact of the iPhone
Brand-new smartphones come with a hefty environmental cost. Producing a new phone involves rare earth mineral mining, energy-intensive manufacturing, and global shipping.
These all contribute to a massive carbon footprint and damage to local ecosystems. Not to mention the landfill impact of discarded phones! (Check out our deep dive into the environmental impact of smartphones for more details.)
The best way to reduce this impact? Make phones last longer by either repairing them when they break, or reselling them when we upgrade. The Right to Repair helps extend a phone’s life in this way.
Refurbished phones help, too: by restoring and reselling used devices, Orchard cuts demand for new production and keeps perfectly good tech out of landfills. In 2024 alone, Orchard customers kept 20,000 phones out of landfills, preventing over 1,700 tonnes of CO₂ emissions.
What are Bill C-244 & C-294?
Right to Repair landed a major win in Canada with the passage of Bill C-244 and C-294, which received Royal Assent in November 2024. These new laws allow the bypassing of digital software locks for repairs, maintenance, and device interoperability.
Previously, Canada’s Copyright Act made bypassing these locks illegal, meaning repair techs risked legal action for diagnosing devices or installing new parts.
Predictably, this limited third-party repair options and forced consumers to rely on manufacturers – often at steep prices.
Now, thanks to C-244 and C-294, repair technicians can break digital locks, making repairs more affordable and keeping phones out of landfills. That’s a victory for consumer rights and sustainability, but we need to go further.
While the new laws permit users to bypass software locks, it is still illegal to sell or share the tools to break those locks. That limits access to these repairs to people tech-savvy enough to break the locks by themselves.
The two bills also don’t require manufacturers to disable software locks or open repair access to third parties, and unauthorized repairs could still void your warranty.
It’s clear that Right to Repair still has more ground to gain in Canada, and it won’t be an easy fight. Here at Orchard, we’ve been committed to the Right to Repair movement since our founding, and we’ve worked with legislators to offer our input on regulatory changes.
Unsurprisingly, Apple (along with other smartphone manufacturers) has long resisted third-party repair access. But with growing public awareness (and pressure), even Apple has made some concessions to Right to Repair in recent years.
Read on to learn Apple’s position and how it affects the affordability of repairs for your iPhone.
Right to Repair, Apple and your iPhone
Apple’s position on Right To Repair
Historically, Apple and other tech companies have lobbied against Right to Repair laws, citing reasons like intellectual property and customer safety.
Apple in particular is also known for making design choices that limit repairability, like non-standard screws and glued-in batteries, and (as we discussed above) using software locks to limit repair access. These choices constrain the repair market, driving up the cost of repairs.
In recent years, however, Apple has begun to soften its stance on certain Right to Repair issues. Significant changes include:
- Under regulatory and public pressure, Apple introduced the Self Service Repair Program in 2022, allowing users to buy official parts and tools under limited conditions.
- In 2024, Apple shifted its longstanding policy to begin allowing used parts in iPhone repairs, with the goal of expanding choice and mitigating environmental impact.
- Also in 2024, iOS 18 rolled back several long-standing restrictions on third-party parts in iPhones (see below for details).
- Apple’s Self Service Repair Program will expand to Canada in 2025,3 years after its U.S. debut, marking a broader commitment to accessibility and user choice beyond the U.S.
We’ve been pleasantly surprised to see Apple moving in the direction of the Right to Repair. We hope these moves reflect a genuine desire to make repair more affordable and accessible moving forward.
Apple Self-Service Repair Store in Canada
Reports in summer 2024 indicated the Self Service Repair program would likely launch in the first few months of the year, though there’s no word yet on a date as of March 2025.
The program will provide free access to the diagnostic software and repair manuals needed to independently fix an iPhone. You (or your repair tech) will need to buy the parts and rent the tools you need from the Self Service Repair Store, Apple’s official third party hardware provider.
Which Apple devices can you repair?
The program supports 42 products, including the latest iPhone models (iPhone 12 and newer) and various Mac laptops, desktops, and displays, but not Apple Watches, iPads, or accessories like AirPods.
Repair manuals, parts, and tools will be accessible through the Self Service Repair Store, Apple’s third-party provider.
Is Self Service Repair making iPhone repairs more affordable?
There’s no Canadian pricing for these parts yet, but based on U.S. prices from the Self Service Repair Store, an iPhone 15 display and screw kit costs $267.96 USD, plus tool rental. Surprisingly, that’s only $11 USD less than it costs for Apple to perform the repair ($279 USD).
For comparison,the price of the repair kit ($267.96 USD) is around $380 CAD at February 2025 exchange rates, and an iPhone 15 screen repair costs $365 CAD in Canada.
At these prices, you’re probably better off going to Apple or a third-party repair shop. Self-Service Repairs are a (slightly) cost-saving option compared to an official Apple repair, but will likely cost more than a third-party shop with an aftermarket part.
So while more consumer choice is a good thing,it doesn’t address the biggest issue: replacement parts are extremely expensive. Unfortunately, that often means users will choose to buy a new phone instead of extending the life of their old, damaged one.
Often, the excessive cost of a repair comes down to smartphone manufacturers’ design choices.
For example: to replace the cracked screen on the iPhone 15 above, you can’t just swap out the broken front glass (which would cost only $10 on its own). All parts of the display are a single unit, so you’ll need to replace the perfectly functional digitizer (touch sensor) and backlight too. That’s expensive, wasteful and difficult.
The situation is even worse for other parts. An iPhone’s back glass is more affordable than a screen. But the repair is expensive because every single part must be removed to replace the back glass.
That means carefully reassembling the phone like the world’s highest-stakes Lego model – not something most users are comfortable with!
This is a dramatic step backwards from earlier phones like the iPhone 4S, where the back case could be replaced by undoing two screws.
So while the Self-Service repair program is a welcome gesture toward Right to Repair, it probably won’t affect the bottom line for most users. iPhones (and other smartphones) just aren’t designed to enable easy, low-cost repairs.
The most affordable and practical repair option is still a repair with a non-Apple part – which Apple continues to resist.
Why Orchard uses non-OEM parts
Even though they’re more accessible than before, original Apple parts remain much more expensive than parts of equal quality from other suppliers.
To help keep the resale price of our phones as low as possible, we use high-quality parts from trusted suppliers. This means that some of the phones we sell contain non-OEM components, and may come with the accompanying “Unknown Part” warning.
Using non-Apple parts: a break in the clouds?
As the device detectives at iFixit discovered, the iPhone 15 is packed with software locks that trigger warning messages or disable features when parts are replaced with ones not purchased directly from Apple.
This is called “parts pairing.” iPhones track their unique parts, and block functionality on new parts if they don’t match what the iPhone expects. Only Apple’s exclusive software can update that internal parts list.
That’s why until recently, third-party screen repairs disabled True Tone and auto brightness display features, while battery swaps triggered “non-genuine part” warnings and removed battery health data.
Bypassing these locks was effectively impossible, which meant these barriers significantly increased the cost of repairs, making repair a less attractive option than simply buying a new phone (at a high financial and environmental cost).
But with iOS 18, Apple dropped a big, under-the-radar update: True Tone, auto brightness, and battery health now remain functional with non-OEM parts. If you replace your battery and update to iOS 18, you’ll still be able to see your battery health – a huge improvement for anyone using third-party parts.
We hope this change is a sign of true progress, and that we’ll see Apple open up more to repair access in the future. Our dream? Repair-friendly design choices that reduce the cost of replacement parts and simplify the repair process.
