The batteries regulation[1] doesn't contain such an exemption. The legal argument that iPhones may be exempt goes like this:
- The batteries regulation is a general regulation and article 11 specifically says the following:
> This paragraph shall be without prejudice to any specific provisions ensuring a higher level of protection of the environment and human health relating to the removability and replaceability of portable batteries by end-users laid down in any Union law on electrical and electronic equipment as defined in Article 3(1), point (a), of Directive 2012/19/EU.
- There is a different regulation, the ecodesign regulation for smartphones and tablets[2], that is more specific and therefore might supersede the batteries regulation on this front, which says:
> (ii) manufacturers, importers or authorised representatives may provide the battery or batteries referred to in point (i)(a) only to professional repairers if manufacturers, importers or authorised representatives ensure that the following requirements are met:
> (a) after 500 full charge cycles the battery has, in a fully charged state, a remaining capacity of at least 83 % of the rated capacity;
> (b) the battery endurance in cycles achieves a minimum of 1 000 full charge cycles and after 1 000 full charge cycles the battery has, in a fully charged state, a remaining capacity of at least 80 % of the rated capacity;
But what exactly is a charge cycle? I mean, the effect on a battery being loaded from 0% to 100% and drained to 0% again is vastly different from a battery being charged from 40% to 50% and being used until 40% ten times in a row.
And how many people have the free mental space to manage the charge capacity of their phone?
I plug mine into the charger when I go to bed, and unplug it in the morning when I start my day. I don't have time to think about phone charge levels much beyond that.
Can’t say I really trust that stuff like “charge only when green energy is available”. It’s a nice idea but whenever I’ve used Android devices my expectation was that sometimes I plug in my device at night but it doesn’t really charge and I am not going to pay top dollar and deal with life in a walled garden to have that experience.
Maybe you can do an 80% charge limit on Android the same way I do on my iPad 10?¹ My charger is plugged into a smart plug, and I have an automation written using Apple Shortcuts that turns that smart plug off via Matter whenever the iPad's charge rises above 80%.
I don't know much about Android but assume there must be some way to do similar automations (because I've never seen in any of the Android vs iPhone arguments someone say go with iPhone because of superior automation support).
I recommend going with Matter for the smart plug because if you use the manufacturer's app to control it those often require that you be logged in. The problem with that (beyond any annoyance you might have at needing to make an account to use your device) is that the login might occasionally expire, then your automation breaks.
¹I can't use Apple's charge limit setting because for some reason I can't even guess at when they finally added it to iPadOS they only added it iPads newer than my iPad 10.
I have latest Android on the Pixel 8. I just checked and found it under Settings > Battery > Battery Health
It specifically has an option for 80% (const) or an
"Adaptive Charge" predictive algorithm that charges to 80% and then only fully charges to 100% right before you typically unplug it from the charger.
I also wonder how this is impacted by time. If I have a device that's at 75% capacity at 200 cycles, but it's 7 years old, does that fail to meet these requirements?
Because my experience has been that the cycle count doesn't matter that much as the battery gets old. Old batteries just lose capacity.
That's another valid point: when you just keep a battery around and don't use it, it also loses capacity at a certain point.
So even when you don't use them, you have to babysit lithium-ion batteries. That's why I still love devices with those crappy AA batteries. In general, those have lower capacity, but you can just dump a device into a drawer for 3 years (remember to take the batteries out or use rechargeables) and just put fresh batteries into the device when you need it.
For example, I have those wireless Sennheiser over-ear headphones, which are probably 10+ years old, but they just keep working because they use AAA rechargeables.
> Consequently, in the case of portable batteries included in products covered by Regulation (EU) 2023/1670, the removability and replaceability obligations set out in Annex II of that Regulation prevail over those set out in Regulation (EU) 2023/1542.
The ecodesign law (spare part but 1000 cycle exemption) pevails over the batteries law.
- The batteries regulation is a general regulation and article 11 specifically says the following:
> This paragraph shall be without prejudice to any specific provisions ensuring a higher level of protection of the environment and human health relating to the removability and replaceability of portable batteries by end-users laid down in any Union law on electrical and electronic equipment as defined in Article 3(1), point (a), of Directive 2012/19/EU.
- There is a different regulation, the ecodesign regulation for smartphones and tablets[2], that is more specific and therefore might supersede the batteries regulation on this front, which says:
> (ii) manufacturers, importers or authorised representatives may provide the battery or batteries referred to in point (i)(a) only to professional repairers if manufacturers, importers or authorised representatives ensure that the following requirements are met:
> (a) after 500 full charge cycles the battery has, in a fully charged state, a remaining capacity of at least 83 % of the rated capacity;
> (b) the battery endurance in cycles achieves a minimum of 1 000 full charge cycles and after 1 000 full charge cycles the battery has, in a fully charged state, a remaining capacity of at least 80 % of the rated capacity;
> (c) the device meets IP67 rating.
[1]: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CEL...
[2]: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CEL...