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.
One thing I haven’t seen mentioned is that this will inevitably make batteries smaller.
If you are supposed to be able to open the phone and remove the battery manufacturers need to design a way to remove the cover, shield other components, create a compartment for the battery, and use sturdier batteries. All of those things take us space. Manufacturers aren’t just going to make phones thicker so that physical space has to be eaten by something… and it’s going to be the battery.
I really liked having a removable battery on my phone 10 years ago in case I had a particularly long/intensive day. But now that I make it through a day without worry this could actually be sorta annoying.
If we are gonna get removable batteries there needs to be a standard battery format so that each company won’t have its own special battery design. One battery design for all devices. This way the battery will work in whichever phone you put it in.