How To Find Out Whether Or Not Apple Will Replace Your iPhone 5 Battery For Free

Apple launched the battery replacement program after learning that some iPhone 5 devices “may suddenly experience shorter battery life or need to be charged more frequently.” It is unknown how many devices were affected by the defective batteries.

Although Apple is going out of their way to replace their defective batteries, this will not happen for every iPhone 5 owner. Not only does the defective iPhone 5 need to have a serial number, falling within a small range, they must also have been bought between September 2012 and January 2013. This new program is also not for just any model of the iPhone 5 and cannot be used on iPhone 5S or the iPhone 5C.

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You'll need the serial number to prove your iPhone has legitimate battery issues. To find the serial number for your phone, go to Settings > General > About > Serial Number. It is about halfway down the page.

Enter the number into the Eligibility box and press Submit.

Even if you get the message that your phone is ineligible, you might be able to get a refund. If you paid for a new battery during the lifetime of your phone, the Replacement Program will offer you a refund for that purchase.

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Head on over to an Apple store or an authorized service shop. If your phone is eligible for the replacement, you'll need to resolve any other damage first, as that can get in the way of the battery replacement. So, say you have a cracked screen, you will have to fix that first (and perhaps pay for it, depending on your warranty.) After that, Apple will replace the battery for free.

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Apple recommends backing up the data of the iPhone 5 using iTunes and iCloud before bringing it to the store. Turning off the “Find My iPhone” app is strongly recommended as well.

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This program covers affected iPhone 5 batteries for 2 years after the first retail sale of the device or until March 1, 2015, whichever provides longer coverage.

In October, Apple reached out to customers because there were several thousand iPhone 5S devices that had shipped with defective batteries, which was about a month after it launched. In 2006, Apple also recalled 1.8 million battery packs for iBook and PowerBook laptop computers due to overheating problems.

In that case iPhone 5 devices manufactured through March 2013 may have sleep/wake buttons that have stopped working or work intermittently.