Replacing battery that without required screw and tool must be preserved please—
this is Fairphone’s unique competitive advantage.
It is especially valuable for people who work outdoors for extended periods,
especially as well as in emergencies, natural disasters, or war situations.
It allows us to avoid relying on power banks,
and using batteries alternately **slows down battery degradation,
extends battery lifespan, and is more environmentally friendly.
We hope that Fairphone 7 will return to a design
that allows quick battery replacement without screws or tools please.
As for battery fixing stability:
We believe that using a snap-fit design(Snap-fit - Wikipedia) is far better
than replacing battery used screws or tool.
I know, I was talking about other companies. For example “Shiftphone 8.1, HMD Skyline 2 GT, Samsung Xcover 7 Pro” as someone else mentioned in a different thread
You were not supposed to swap the battery on the fairphones on a daily routing ever. Not on the fairphone 4 nor on the 5. It would worn out the battery connections.
The Fairphone 6 is still perfectly fine in the regard of easy battery replacement when the battery gets worn out. Like each 2-4 year not day.
I agree, it’s about another way to envision batteries from another perspective.
I’m not saying this choice makes it a superior product, just that for stability and repair purposes, it changes the focus from a rigid swappable battery to a semi-rigid replaceable with marginally more work needed.
As a FP4 user I can attest that it’s a fun party trick to be able to pop out the battery like that and amuse other people.
In practice I have never carried a second charged battery. In my opinion if you’re going to carry another object around, might as well make it a small powerbank for more versatility.
So I don’t mind the screws on the new one. What I have actually wished for was a phone case with a tiny powerbank in it, like you can buy for some of the popular phones.
Or a bulging back cover that allows for a thicker battery.
Maybe there’s an opportunity for an enterprising person to do this with the FP6.
Fairphone 1 to 5 were designed for tool-free battery replacement — not as a misuse, but as a core part of Fairphone’s guiding philosophy.
The claim about connector wear lacks real evidence.
I’ve used Fairphone 3, 4, and 5 for 6 years, swapping batteries almost every day — and I’ve never experienced connector damage. In fact, many phone and battery connectors (such as pogo pins) are designed to handle over 10,000 cycles of insertion/removal, which is consistent with international hardware standards (e.g., USB-C is rated for 10,000 cycles).
High-quality contacts like USB ports are designed for thousands of cycles — battery connectors can match that.
Using multiple batteries alternately reduces strain per cell and prolongs overall battery life.
For outdoor workers or in emergencies, spare batteries are far more reliable than power banks.
Shifting from snap-fit to 8 screws in Fairphone 6 is a clear step may back from modular and repairable design.
Modularity is about giving users freedom — not enforcing restrictive usage cycles.
If users can’t swap batteries frequently, they’re forced to rely on USB charging — which increases wear and tear on the USB port. Many phones break due to loose or damaged USB connectors, not because of the battery. Replaceable batteries reduce that risk.
Even if the battery connector eventually wears out, you can just replace the battery connector module — that’s the whole point of a modular phone. It avoids full device replacement, making it both more sustainable and cost-effective.
My fairphone 3 4 5 for this 7years no any problem in connector modul
But in future we hope every modul able to replacing when modul damage just like Project Ara
What I don’t like is the “press on” power connectors and ribbon. That requires more skill to remove and refit. I do wonder if these changes made the phone cheaper as a result?
On the “why” of the battery screws … (this might have been explained before elsewhere)
What I was told at the Launch event by Fairphone was that based on “customer data”, customers found the recent Fairphone models bulky and heavy. So one of Fairphone’s targets in designing the FP6 was to make it smaller, flatter, lighter. This has been achieved (see Fairphone dimensions and weights). However, this resulted in the need for battery screws. Perhaps a closer look at the battery helps to explain this.
The photos aren’t perfect, but what you can probably spot is that the downside of the battery (visibile in photos 2 and 3, silver grey label) and the upside (all black and with lime colour fairphone logo, not fully visible in the photos) are not symmetrical. And the upside is enforced with a hard plate that almost feels like metal. The downside is not hard-cased (to allow for an overall flatter device).
Now the screws serve to ensure that the battery sits tight and does not move.
My own concern with this is a different one. My FP3 experienced a dive in August 2023, it was fully submerged in water. Thanks to easy access to the battery, I could remove the battery within seconds. I disassembled the whole device to the max afterwards, rinsed the unsensitive parts and gave it 72 hours to dry. The FP3 remains my daily driver until today and shows no sign of aging (although the liquid ingress sensors are both red, probably from the dive).
P.S.: Useful to know: As in the FP4 and FP5, hardware tests can be found
by dialling * # * # 2 8 8 6 # * # *
(I was a bit nervous if I had succeeded in pressing the battery press connector correctly into place again )
I have my own story with this. However, press connectors first appeared in the FP3 and then (even more of them) in the FP4 and FP5. In my eyes, they are a special challenge when it comes to connecting the display of the FP4 and FP5 (see link).
The difference between replacing the battery on this fairphone Vs other non-fairphanes is the difference between 5-10 minutes in the hands of any halfway competent person with a little screwdriver, and 30-60 minutes in the hands of a professional with replacement glue and other adhesives, possibly a little oven as well, on hand.
Fairphones number 1 priority seems to be social: being fair to all the miners and workers in the supply chain, and the people living in poor conditions surrounded by e-waste.
Shiftphone is an alternative to Fairphone, they are not as ethical but do have a swappable battery like you seem to have as a high priority.
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