In a time when an iPhone can be preordered, customized, and on its way to your doorstep all through a touch-screen tap, it’s almost quaint to remember that people used to camp out for smartphone releases. That was once the regular routine of Andrew Erickson, a longtime tech YouTuber, who recalled to me with a mixture of nostalgia and awe the time he braved the rain at 4:30 a.m. to join a line for the newest iPhone. The line snaked through the mall, nearly reaching the parking lot.
Next month, when Apple is expected to launch the iPhone 18 Pro, Erickson has no plans to even buy the phone, let alone fight crowds for it. Instead, along with a growing number of Americans, Erickson is buying used. He’s fed up with incremental improvements in gadgets, he told me, and is more interested in getting an old version of the iPhone 17 Pro when it hits the secondhand market at a discount. Already, almost half of his current devices were acquired secondhand, and as electronics prices soar amid an AI-fueled chip shortage, he expects that portion to grow. “The argument’s just getting weaker and weaker to buy brand-new,” he said.
Based on the numbers, old tech products are indeed being looked at in a new light. Globally, the size of the industry could reach $153.4 billion this year, up from $104.1 billion four years ago. The used-smartphone market alone is expected to grow by more than 12 percent in 2026, according to the International Data Corporation, which forecasts that the market for new smartphones will experience a record drop this year. Growth in secondhand electronics and refurbished gadgets that have been restored to full working condition now outpaces that of new products on eBay, the e-commerce giant reports.
I’m on the last iPhone mini. I refuse to upgrade because I refuse to use phones above 6". It’s insane to me that everybody wants to use shovels instead of phones.
As someone who exclusively shops second-hand the mere existence of this article feels like an omen for prices.
The prices of new electronics have skyrocketed, the used market always follows so you’re right to be worried.
They’ll force you to upgrade by making the software run shittier and shittier on your old hardware with each update. That, and your not-easily-replaceable battery will inevitably leave the chat before you are ready to upgrade.
EU made repairable batteries mandatory, so that will hit the used market in a few years.
which is why you only buy unlockable android phones, lineageOS is if anything only going to make your device faster every update.
The key here is to know when to stop upgrading. With old Apple devices I always hang back a version or two and don’t ever upgrade to the last version that supports your hardware.
This is not good for security.
5G network upgrade ensures the used phone market in Canada is a lot more limited than it was one year ago.
I’m sure they’ll come up with some other reason to force us all to upgrade soon enough. Wife and I are seriously looking at Linux phones or 5G-capable flip phones for our next refresh, due to Google’s noose-tightening bullshit.
Does Canada not have LTE?
Most (all?) Canadian carriers shut down/are shutting down 2G and 3G, so older phones don’t work at all.
It also means that locations that have spotty 4G connectivity can have big dead zones now, for non-5G-enabled devices, that used to be covered by 3G bands.
Even some 5G phones are affected. Like, I have an international model phone that has most but not all Rogers 4G/5G bands that used to fall back to 3G, but now is just worse.
My issue isnt what a new phone offrers, its what it is taking that is now the issue, and impacting my decision.
Globally, the size of the industry could reach $153.4 billion this year…
For reference this is the “Second-hand Electronic Products Market”; I’ve never heard it referred to as an industry but I guess it is. And good. It’s deserved. Phone manufactures certainly don’t deserve credit for mediocre devices.
as Nabila Popal, a senior director at the International Data Corporation, reminded me, prices reflect demand: If people keep buying up the used gadgets, those prices are bound to shoot up, too.
Hopefully it’ll be less extreme than with desktops/RAM, though. Phones are at least single units that aren’t so easy to be hoarded or cannibalized for the most expensive parts in them. Most people who want a good phone won’t go out and buy 4-8 mediocre ones. Most people who want a good phone can settle for a popular flagship across several years manufacture, which might have been leased out previously.
Smartphone technology is reaching a plateau. Does the human being really need 16K streams in their mobile device?
What happens when the wavelength is so short that you have knife-edge diffraction with a flea?
I’ve had my Galaxy S9+ for roughly eight years now. The battery doesn’t hold much charge, and the screen has this known bug where it stays completely black unless I do this funny workaround by activating Always On Display first and only then turning the screen on.
But everything on the market now comes with some catch, I really don’t want to give up that SD slot. And I’m unemployed and prices are fucked. So I’ll ride this thing out until it fully dies - which feels like it may happen any day now, honestly…
So you run Lineage or Graphene on it? The default Android has been without security updates for years by this point, as Samsung just loves to create e-waste to increase shareholder value.
I believe some motos still have mSD and headphone jacks. My stylus 5g from two years ago still had one on release. They’re pretty decent mid range phones, grabbed one on sale for $250.
They do. They are huge, have poor software updates, and generally can’t be used with custom roms (hopefully this changes in the future), but bang for the buck the moto g line of phones is hard to beat. Weirdly, the 2024 and 2025 phones are the best to look at, the newer models are literal downgrades due to memory prices.
I can’t wait until we get replaceable battery phones in the EU.
We already have. You are just buying the wrong phones. E.g Fairphone
I want every phone to be the right phone.
Yes. This is the way
Alrgiht. Since its ride until this thing dies…is there an alternative OS for me humble Samsung S21 Ultra? I understand Graphene doesn’t work with it. I just need to call, 2FA support, Podcasts, Firefox, Maps, and use Signal. That’s it. And I can do without maps.
