Battery Replacement for 17-inch MacBook Pro to cost $179
While the new MacBook Pro has an advertised 5-year battery life, at some point it will need to be replaced. Apple briefly noted on the MacBook support pages that a battery replacement will cost $179. This includes the cost of shipping the unit, and the cost of taking the system apart to replace the battery.
The $179 price-point is compared to the $129 price-point of a current 17-inch MacBook Pro battery. However, the new MacBook Pro battery lasts 60% longer each charge cycle, and lasts about twice as long in terms of lifespan. That means that you would have spent up to $230 to replace the 17-inch MacBook Pro battery, in the same time space as one $179 replacement on the new MacBook Pro.
Difference being that with the old model you could buy a new replacement battery and do the job yourself, and you would have like 30 seconds of downtime. When you send the new 17″ off to Apple you are without a laptop for a couple of weeks. Nice ‘improvement’…8/
Apple uses overnight shipping, and their typical turnaround is far less than a week.
In 10 years, I’ve only had one Apple-repair downtime last for two weeks. That was during the MacBook Sudden Sleep defect… where MacBooks were failing left and right.
Apple also says that the turnaround on a battery replacement is under a week. And, this looks like a repair that can be done inside of an Apple Retail Store, and doesn’t need to be sent off to depot.