Apple iPhone XR Screen Repairs Are Costly At $199 Without AppleCare+

Apple's entry-level iPhone for 2018 is the iPhone XR announced in September along with the iPhone XS and iPhone XS Max devices. Word is that the October ship date announced at the unveiling of the XR was due to issues with the notched LCD. Whatever the issue, the iPhone XR is expected to ship this week. Ahead of that launch, some details about what the XR will cost to repair if you break it have surfaced, and it sounds as if buyers should get the AppleCare+ warranty on the device (or at least buy a case).

Buyers who crack the screen on their iPhone XR, and don’t have AppleCare+, will shell out $199 for a screen replacement. Consider that the iPhone XR starts at $749 for the 64GB version, and a single cracked screen will cost you about 25% of the purchase price of the smartphone. If you drop the XR and break anything else that repair will cost you $399; these prices come straight from the Apple support page detailing costs.

Apple is notorious for the high cost of repairs for its products; repairs for the iPhone XS Max screen will cost $329 with an "Other Damage" fee of $599. If you bust the screen on the iPhone XS, that repair will cost you $279 with other damage costing $649. If you opt for AppleCare+, a screen only repair will set you back $29, and the other damage fee is $99. AppleCare+ covers you for two incidents of accidental damage; standard AppleCare+ costs $149 and AppleCare+ with Theft and Loss is $249 for the iPhone XR.

While many smartphone shoppers out there have held out for the cheaper iPhone XR, the iPhone XS Max has been outselling its smaller iPhone XS sibling by a wide margin according to at leas one report. That detail came from analyst Ming-Chi Kuo who wrote in a research note that the XS Max is outselling the smaller device by a factor of three or four times. Kuo also reported that the most popular XS Max was the 256GB option noting that the 512GB version faces a severe shortage.