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[EU] It's official: Smartphones will need to have replaceable batteries by 2027
(www.androidauthority.com)
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Was hoping it wouldn’t be phrased that way. That’s going to make phones less waterproof and significantly reduce the battery capacity or increase the size.
I’d be much more happy with a screwdriver and sliding the lid off, disconnecting a connector that’s made available for end user fiddling, swapping in the new battery and then putting it back in.
On the other hand I hope manufacturers find a way. This might open up for bigger batteries where the battery is basically the outside of the phone and you just wrap it in a case.
Actually, thinking about it - external batteries might be the solution to waterproofness.
This will likely also see a rise in cheap knockoff batteries catching fire. It’s not unprecedented, and people are like “a battery is a battery”. Well, they aren’t.
Will be interesting to see how this is handled.
The last time I heard phone batteries catching fire was the Samsung Note 7 and those weren't user replacable. There's a lot of fearmongering on what you wrote, it almost sounds like a script the manufacturers' lobby would write to avoid this legislation. Are you really assuming the EU doesn't have laws and safety regulations for Li-ion batteries et al.?