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Your MacBook Pro worked the day you bought it, and it still works. What changed is a line on an Apple support page you have never opened. Seven years after Apple stops selling a model, it joins the Apple obsolete list, and no Apple Store or authorised shop can order a part for it. You paid once. The lock-in arrived years later, dated by Apple's last sale, not your receipt.

How long will Apple repair my iPhone or Mac?

Apple repairs most iPhones and Macs for up to seven years after it stops selling the model, with normal service for the first five and parts-permitting service in years five to seven.

Apple's own support page, Vintage and obsolete products, updated on 15 September 2026, draws both lines. A product is vintage once Apple stopped distributing it for sale more than five and less than seven years ago. Past seven it is obsolete: Apple discontinues all hardware service, and providers cannot order parts. So the repair price stops mattering, because nobody in Apple's network may quote one.

The clock is the part owners get wrong. It starts when Apple stops selling the model, not when you bought it (unless, I suppose, you bought on the very last day). The usual advice, wait until something breaks, is outdated for any device past year five. By then the repair you postponed may be one Apple can no longer do.

Two other clocks run beside this one. The date Intel Macs stop getting security updates can beat the repair cut-off, and on an iPhone it pays to check what an out-of-warranty battery replacement costs while Apple still stocks your part.

That conditional window is already open for many Macs. TechRepublic's 3 April 2026 report on Apple's spring update stressed that vintage repairs depend on parts being in stock, and its newly vintage list runs from the Late 2013 Mac Pro to the 2020 Intel MacBook Air. Own one, and a quote can now be refused. That deferred screen fix is due now.

Four numbers set the terms; the share of laptop life is my own arithmetic from Apple's thresholds.

The battery extension sounds generous until you see what it leaves out. Khaleej Times reported on 16 August 2026 that the 2018 15-inch MacBook Pro and the iPhone X had turned obsolete. That MacBook can still, parts permitting, get a new battery from Apple. A failed display gets a no.

What the Apple obsolete list actually takes away

Moving from vintage to obsolete takes away every Apple and authorised repair except, on Mac laptops, a battery swap, and it leaves independent shops with salvaged or aftermarket parts as your only route.

Read the table by your model's age since its last sale.

A vintage model has between zero and two years of Apple repairs left, my own arithmetic from Apple's two thresholds, and Apple never says where in that range you sit. The April report dated the iPhone 11 Pro's move to vintage to January 2026, which puts its obsolete date around January 2028. I think Apple should print each model's last sale date on that page, since the whole policy runs on it.

Can I still get an obsolete iPhone repaired?

Yes, an obsolete iPhone can still be repaired by an independent shop using salvaged or aftermarket parts, but Apple and its authorised providers will refuse the job and cannot order the part at any price.

TechRepublic's verdict on repair after that point is fair: possible, just less predictable. That means donor-device or aftermarket parts of uneven quality, with no Apple quote to compare against.

The second date owners miss is software. Per 9to5Mac figures cited in the same Khaleej Times report, the iPhone X topped out at iOS 16 and the 2018 MacBook Pro at macOS Sequoia. Software support usually ends first, so check both dates before paying: a new screen on a phone that apps are leaving behind fixes the wrong problem.

The EU is the one market where part of this is law. Under ecodesign rules in force since 20 June 2025, Hardware Busters reported, phone and tablet makers must keep critical spare parts for seven years after a model leaves sale and deliver them within 5-10 working days. That covers only models sold after mid-2025, though. And replacing is not cheap, given the memory shortage pushing phone prices up.

• A refused vintage quote has no appeal: the problem is stock, not policy.
• Non-genuine screens and batteries can trigger an unknown-part notice on recent iPhones.
• Both lists change several times a year, so check again before buying used.

The decision is repair now or budget for the replacement, so make it this week. Open Apple's Vintage and obsolete products page and find the year your model left sale. Between five and seven, book the repair you have been putting off while a part may exist. Past seven, ask an independent shop now what a battery and a screen would cost, so you choose on numbers rather than in a panic.

Somewhere in year three, the phone you paid off starts sending a second bill. Battery Health in Settings slips under 80%, iOS quietly reins in the processor, and the iPhone battery replacement cost Apple quotes for an iPhone 17 Pro, $119 according to 9to5Mac's September 2025 rundown of Apple repair prices, stops being trivia. It becomes a bill to pay, insure or dodge with a new phone, and nobody mentioned it at the shop.

Why does the iPhone battery bill land in year three?

It lands in year three because Apple rates iPhone 15 and newer batteries to keep their health line for 1,000 full charge cycles, and a phone charged once a day uses roughly one cycle every day.

Those ratings come from Apple's own support page on iPhone battery and performance, updated in June 2026. A cycle is a full battery's worth of charge, used in one day or across several top-ups. The arithmetic after that is mine, not Apple's: at one cycle a day, that rating runs out after about 33 months, so a September phone crosses the line around its third summer.

Crossing it isn't cosmetic. The same Apple page lists what iOS performance management can do to a worn battery: cap the processor and graphics chip, stretch app launch times, drop frame rates, dim the backlight and lower speaker volume. Skip the swap and you pay in speed and brightness instead of dollars, which is the worse trade, or at least the more irritating one, for anyone who works from the phone.

And the standard warranty won't step in. Apple covers a defective battery, never one that simply wore out. That gap between purchase price and ownership cost mirrors the memory shortage pushing up every new phone's price, which is why upgrading has stopped being the easy escape. Apple plays the same long game with the cut-off for Intel Mac security updates.

Four numbers decide whether you pay once or insure, drawn from Apple's support page and a September 2024 MacTrast report, plus one ratio worked out from the repair prices below.

The warranty figure is the one people misread: coverage stops long before the battery is designed to wear, so the only route to a free swap runs through a paid plan, and only if your timing cooperates.

iPhone battery replacement cost: pay once or buy AppleCare+?

Pay once if you rarely break glass, because AppleCare+ waives the battery fee only after wear passes Apple's threshold while coverage is active, and most of the plan's value sits in screen and theft cover.

Apple's AppleCare+ for iPhone page (accessed October 2026) lists service fees but no plan prices, so the table compares what each path charges when something breaks; base iPhone 17 pricing is from the 9to5Mac list.

Read down the right-hand column and the pattern is plain: AppleCare+ is glass insurance with a battery perk bolted on, not the other way round. Weighing it for the battery alone? Paying once is cheaper and needs no luck with timing.

Is it worth replacing the battery or buying a new phone?

Replacing the battery is almost always worth it on an iPhone 15 or newer, because the swap lifts the performance limits for roughly another three years at a fraction of what a new phone costs.

The catch is that the fee keeps climbing. MacTrast's report traced it from $69 before the iPhone 14 arrived in 2022 to today's base rate, and linked the Pro premium to larger cells in a metal shell that spreads heat and takes extra labour to fit. Budget the current fee for a 2029 swap and you will probably come up short.

Here is the grey area, and it is my opinion rather than a sourced fact: Battery Health is Apple's own number, and no independent standard audits it, the same blind spot that the missing battery State-of-Health standard for used EVs exposes. You are deciding a repair on a gauge the repairer controls, though I still trust it enough to act on.

• Cycles count total charge used, so draining and refilling twice a day reaches the line far sooner.
• Book the swap before any plan lapses; the date matters more than the exact reading.
• Prices change at each launch, so check Apple's estimate before booking.

Tonight, open Settings, tap Battery, then Battery Health and Charging, and read the number. If it sits below the line and your plan is live, book the free swap this week; if you have no plan, pay the fee and keep the phone, because a fresh battery is the cheapest year of Apple ownership you will ever buy.

Related: when your iPhone lands on the Apple obsolete list

You bought the 16-inch MacBook Pro in 2019 because it was the one built to last. It has lasted. The keyboard is fine and the screen still looks sharp, but the purchase never told you the one date that matters now: when Intel Mac security updates stop, a deadline Apple set years after your receipt was filed. That date is close enough to plan around, and the bill it brings is bigger than one laptop.

macOS 27 launched on 14 September 2026 for M1 and later Macs plus the A18 Pro MacBook Neo, and for no Intel machine at all, Macworld's compatibility guide confirmed that day. Your Intel Mac stops gaining features now.

Why Intel Mac Security Updates Now Have an End Date

Intel Macs now have a security end date because macOS Tahoe 26 is the last release Apple built for Intel processors, and Apple keeps patching an older macOS only for a limited stretch after newer versions replace it.

Tahoe was already a filter. Apple's compatibility page lists only these Intel machines: the 2019 16-inch MacBook Pro, the 2020 13-inch MacBook Pro with four Thunderbolt 3 ports, the 2020 27-inch iMac and the 2019 Mac Pro. Missing from that list? Your clock is already shorter.

Windows owners just watched Microsoft blink, with consumer ESU for Windows 10 quietly extended to October 2027. Apple sells no such extension, so there is no paid lever to pull when Tahoe's patches stop. Nor would I bank on a cheaper replacement while the AI-driven memory shortage behind 2026 smartphone price hikes keeps pressure on RAM.

Four numbers decide your timing. Macworld's September 2026 guide supplies the patch window it expects for Tahoe and the hardware floor for macOS 27's AI Siri voice features. The firm share is my arithmetic, that floor against AppleInsider's June 2026 estimate of a fall 2028 end.

The free audit matters most. On the Intel Mac, System Information's Applications list shows each app's kind, and anything marked Intel rather than Universal needs a new version on Apple silicon. Already moved? Apple says macOS 26.4 may show a notice when an app leans on Rosetta.

Should You Keep or Replace an Intel Mac?

Keep a Mac on Apple's Tahoe list through 2027 if its apps already run on Apple silicon, but sort out any Intel-only app first, since any replacement running macOS 28 or later will refuse to open it.

The common advice says replace now. I think that's backwards for anyone on the Tahoe list, because the new Mac's real price includes every licence you buy again.

Read the software row against the patch row. Your Mac is probably patched to fall 2028, but the bridge for Intel-only apps on a replacement closes in fall 2027, so the software decision is roughly a year more urgent than the hardware one. That gap is my reading of the dates, not a published figure.

What Happens to Intel Apps When Rosetta Is Removed?

Once macOS 28 arrives in fall 2027, apps built only for Intel stop opening on Apple silicon Macs, because Apple has named macOS 27 as the last release with general Rosetta support.

Apple's developer notice of 1 September 2026 puts it without hedging: after that update, Intel-only apps "will no longer run on Mac computers with Apple silicon." So a licence bought years ago now expires against a Mac you have not bought yet.

The one carve-out covers "older, unmaintained gaming titles that rely on Intel-based frameworks." Old games survive. Your accounting package does not. AppleInsider names CrossOver and Parallels as workarounds, and I'd treat either as a bridge, not a home: another licence to preserve abandoned code, retested at every macOS update. Or it holds for years. Nobody can promise that, which is rather the point.

Watch these before the calendar forces your hand:

• Subscriptions raising their macOS minimum before Tahoe's patches end.
• Drivers and plug-ins that lag their host app's Apple silicon version.
• Machine-locked licences to deactivate before you wipe the Intel Mac.
• A used M-series Mac with no honest health report, the same trap as used-EV resale with no battery State-of-Health standard.

This week, open System Information on the Intel Mac, sort Applications by Kind, and email the developer of every Intel-only app you depend on asking for their Apple silicon date. That list, not the calendar, decides whether you buy in 2027 or ride Tahoe to its last patch.