Samsung
After Google and iFixit launched a parts store about a month ago, Samsung and iFixit’s self-repair program is also available. iFixit hosts an official Samsung parts store that Samsung says sells parts “at the same price we offer our affiliated repair providers.” The repair site now has a number of official repair guides written in the usual excellent style, and Samsung will begin selling iFixit parts and tools at its retail locations.
The official repair program is a good start, but it’s not very comprehensive. The parts store currently ships to the US and only covers the S21, S20 and Tab S7 series of devices. With three sizes of each phone, this supports seven models in total. Samsung releases about 40 devices a year, so there is a long list of unsupported devices. This list also doesn’t include the latest flagship models, such as the production S22 phone and the S8 tablet.
announcement
The only way to get a screen is to buy this screen, phone body and battery combo pack. It’s like half a phone!
iFixit
The store’s official parts and guides only cover the back glass, charging port, and a “display assembly” combination that requires you to buy “the phone screen, metal frame, bezel, and battery” in one package A full list would look like iFixit’s unofficial iPhone store, which has about 30 individual parts. iFixit has 17 guides for something like the S21, but only three of them are marked as “official”.
Still, getting companies to care about repairability is a major achievement. Samsung and iFixit have had a rocky relationship since Samsung abandoned plans for a partnership in 2017, so it’s nice to see the company embrace the right-to-repair movement. Apple also recently launched a repair program, but again, the details leave a lot to be desired: the system relies on a customer renting an £80 repair kit just to open a phone.
Both iFixit and Samsung mention plans to expand the program in the future with “more devices and repair options.” Some parts, such as the battery/display kit, even include a return label to send the old parts to Samsung for proper recycling.