Apple’s $29 iPhone battery replacement program will expire in December

AP

• Last year, Apple instituted a program that would
  replace any battery that was out-of-warranty, for iPhone 6 or
  later, for just $29 — a $50 price drop from the usual $79
  cost.
• If you own an iPhone 6 or later, and you have battery
  issues, you have until December 31, 2018 to take advantage of
  this low price to replace your battery.

If you own an iPhone 6 or later and you have issues with your
phone’s battery life, now’s the time to visit an Apple Store and
get your battery replaced.

Last December,
Apple acknowledged something that iPhone owners had suspected
for some time: that it had been quietly “throttling,” or
lowering, the performance of older iPhones. The goal was to
preserve battery life on those older phones, and to
prevent them from shutting down unexpectedly, but customers
felt like Apple communicated this message too late, as many had
come to believe that iPhones purposefully got slower to compel
people to upgrade to newer models.

After a good deal of consumer outrage, Apple addressed iPhone
battery and performance in an
open letter to customers in December 2017.

The most important part of Apple’s informational letter was an
offer towards the very end: Apple would reduce the price
of an out-of-warranty iPhone battery replacement, from $79 to
just $29, “for anyone with an iPhone 6 or later whose battery
needs to be replaced, available worldwide through December
2018.”

And so, if you own an iPhone 6, iPhone 6S, iPhone 7, or any other
phones made after that, and are experiencing battery issues —
maybe it’s draining faster than it used to — head to an Apple
store before December.

A small anecdote for you: My fiancée owns an iPhone 6S and had
been experiencing battery issues for months. She’d constantly
need to recharge her phone at work and at home, and felt like it
wasn’t always this bad. So a couple of months ago, we visited an
Apple Store, where an employee measured her phone’s battery life
and found the degradation to be at about 83%. Apple says it will
offer to replace batteries when battery degradation reaches 80%,
but the employee gave my fiancée the option to replace it right
then and there for $29. So we did that, and walked around the
mall for a few hours while we waited. It was worth the wait:
Since that visit, she’s seen a noticeable improvement in her
phone’s battery life, and no longer needs to charge it throughout
the day.

So if you’re experiencing anything similar, go visit an Apple
Store before December 31, and pay the $30 to get your battery
replaced. You’ll be paying more if you choose to wait.