Making good on its promise, Google is giving Pixel Fold owners in various countries the ability to repair their phones by providing spare parts through iFixit. Support for the device is available in the regions where it is sold, including the US, UK, and Germany.
The company is being quite generous here because it looks like you can repair just about anything. You name it, there’s a part for it. You can fix the battery, the earpiece, the fingerprint sensor, the front camera, the rear lens, and even a portion of the logic board. It feels like the only thing that’s missing is the phone’s metal frame.
Each component comes with its own extensive How-to guide that takes people through the process of repairing the foldable step-by-step. Plus, they each have various warnings informing users to, at certain points, be careful. Corners of the smartphone’s glass are fragile, for example, so it’s recommended that you “use plenty of heat and be very gentle.”
Of course, you can both fix Outer and Inner Screens on the Pixel Fold. But there is a major price discrepancy here that may severely limit your ability to do repairs.
(Image credit: iFixit)
Pricey parts
The pieces themselves are decently priced, for the most part. For example, the inner front camera costs $43/£38/€43 for just the lens. If you don’t have the tools, you can get the full kit for $50/£45/€50. You’ll see other kitted options for most of the parts, too. The Outer Screen is one of the pricier pieces as it costs $160/£155/€160 to replace, barring any missing tools.
The Inner Screen, however, takes it to the extreme as it costs a whopping $900 or $910, if you go for the repair kit. That’s a little over half the Pixel Fold’s price tag. In the UK, you’re looking at £895 for the standalone screen and £905 for the kit. German users are looking at €900 on the display with the kit sporting a €910 price tag.
It’s also the most difficult component to replace as you essentially have to gut the device of its internal hardware before transferring everything over. It’ll take you about three to four hours to finish. Even iFixit recommends proceeding “with caution and patience.”
(Image credit: iFixit)
Limitations
Before you run off to buy the parts for your Pixel Fold, there are a couple of limitations you need to be made aware of. First, some items are out of stock. No word on when they’ll come back, but you can sign up to receive notifications on their respective product page. Second, iFixit is limiting purchases in the United States to seven per customer unless you’re a business owner operating under the iFixit Pro program.
We reached out to iFixit asking if it could clarify the “limited to seven per customer” rule. It could mean that you can’t buy more than seven in a single order or maybe it’s seven per person forever – no more after that. The wording was a little confusing. This story will be updated at a later time.
With this support, the Pixel Fold is now the only foldable on iFixit’s website offering extensive repairs. You can replace the front screen on the Motorola Razr, but that’s it. If you want to know more about this classification of device, check out TechRadar’s list of the best foldable phones for 2023.
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