A year of the EU energy label on phones: what actually changed for repairers

Since 20 June 2025, every new smartphone and tablet sold in the EU carries an energy label. That label also shows a repairability score. More than a year on, the question is a simple one: do you notice it at the bench?

The answer is yes — but not in the place most people look.

What is on the label

The label shows seven things: the energy class, how long the battery lasts on one charge, how many charge cycles it survives, how well the device handles drops, how easy it is to repair, and the IP rating for dust and water. Both drop resistance and repairability run from A to E, with A as the best.

The rules behind the label matter more than the picture itself. A battery has to retain at least 80 per cent of its original capacity after 800 full charge cycles. A manufacturer has to keep supplying spare parts for seven years after a model leaves the market, and deliver them within five to ten working days. The operating system has to keep receiving updates for at least five years. And professional repairers have to be given access to the repair software and firmware that goes with it.

That last point slipped through quietly, and for our trade it is the most important item on the whole list.

What did change

Parts and documentation. Where a few years ago you still had to work out which detour would get you an original part, there is now a supplier and a delivery time. Manufacturers also publish their repair manuals more openly; in early September the Dutch consumer organisation Consumentenbond found that Apple does so for the iPhone 15 and newer, although in their view manufacturer websites are still often hard to navigate.

That sounds dull, but it is exactly the difference between a repair you can offer and a repair you have to turn away. A shop that can get parts for seven years can help customers with that model for seven years.

What did not change

The devices themselves do not open any more easily. In that same study of 1 September 2026, Consumentenbond looked at 149 phones. On two of them the battery can be replaced without tools. Two. The Fairphone 6 is the only one to reach class A for repairability, because it is built from separate blocks.

That is down to an exception in the rules: a device that has to be waterproof may stay glued. More than half of the phones tested fall under it. So the regulation asks for a replaceable battery while accepting at the same time that it is held in place with adhesive.

And then there is price. The regulation says parts must be available at a reasonable price, but no figure is attached and nobody enforces it. A screen for an iPhone 17 costs more than 400 euros according to Consumentenbond, roughly 40 per cent of the price of a new phone, while in practice consumers are not willing to go beyond 30 per cent. Actual price caps are under discussion for 2027.

What that means at the bench

The label changes nothing about the work itself. A glued device still only opens with heat, patience and the right angle. A battery held on pull tabs or adhesive still asks that you know when to stop pulling. And a device that came in waterproof should go back out waterproof — so it needs a new seal, not the old strip that was still half attached.

What does change is that you can now order the right part and open the manufacturer's manual alongside it. The problem has shifted from availability to craftsmanship. That is precisely where the difference lies between two shops that both have the same screen on the shelf.

From the outside, a customer cannot see that difference. They see two prices and pick the lower one. That is why we work with a quality mark: it sets down how the work is done, with which parts, and what happens when something goes wrong. An energy label says something about the device. A quality mark says something about the shop the device goes to.

What we do with it in the training

There will be no separate lesson on European legislation. It does show up in what we have people practise: getting a battery loose without bending it, removing screen adhesive cleanly and building it back up, and putting the seal back the way it belongs. These are not theory questions but handling skills you only master after doing them ten times or so, with an instructor watching.

The same goes for the sign-off list on which we record what someone can do. It does not say that a trainee knows the regulation. It says that they can replace a battery without damage, and that they have shown it.

In short

The law opened the door to parts, manuals and software. It did not open the phone. That stays handwork, and it will stay that way for a while yet.

Want to learn the trade, or find out what the quality mark asks of an affiliated shop? It is all on the website, and you are welcome to call us if you would rather talk it through.