Apple iPhone 16 Trade-In Tips: Getting Your Next Phone Using Your Old One

If you’re on the lookout for a new iPhone this vacation season, there are many choices to purchase one at a wide range of worth ranges. You might spring for the most recent and best iPhone 16 Pro or Pro Max, or it can save you some cash going with an iPhone 14 or iPhone 15. You might even take a look at Apple’s Certified Refurbished store for reductions on reconditioned gadgets. Whichever choice you select, sadly Apple does not promote any of its iPhones on a budget. To assist carry down the general price, buying and selling in or promoting your beforehand used iPhone might be a method to get a considerable low cost off your subsequent cellphone.

Trading in your gadget — particularly if it is in good situation — might provide you with credit score that may cowl a big portion of the price of a brand new cellphone. Plus, there are many methods to perform this, with payout potential based mostly on how a lot effort you place into it. 

We’ll go over a number of completely different routes you’ll be able to take to take advantage of cash doable out of your current iPhone. You can begin with the best path, which generally entails a trade-in cope with your wi-fi provider, and work your approach as much as web sites the place you promote the gadget however might reap the next revenue by doing that work your self.

Read extra: Best iPhone 16 and that iPhone 16 Pro circumstances

iPhone trade-in provider offers: Quick money with strings

During Apple’s iPhone 16 announcement, the corporate made some extent to state that credit towards shopping for an iPhone 16 Pro might be as excessive as $1,000 when buying and selling in an iPhone 12 Pro or newer mannequin. Those credit are actual — and may go as excessive as $1,300 with Boost Mobile — however you might want to be keen to place up with the carriers’ tremendous print. Largely, this implies signing up for particular price plans in a provider’s portfolio, buying and selling in your gadget (that the provider will probably recondition and resell for its personal revenue) and staying signed up with a particular wi-fi provider for 2 to a few years to obtain the total low cost.

It’s some huge cash in financial savings, however it’s primarily a contract. If you determine you now not like your wi-fi provider, you will end up needing to pay out your gadget’s steadiness whereas forfeiting any remaining credit score. If you realize that you’d stick to that provider throughout that specified time interval, then it might be tempting. 

Wireless provider plan offers pop up rather a lot, and generally it is priceless to not signal a contract to stay versatile ought to the fitting deal seem. For occasion, again in 2017 when Sprint was nonetheless an impartial provider, it provided a free yr of service for anybody keen to attempt it out. At the time, I used to be on a Verizon plan shared with my household, however my cellphone was paid off. I opted to take the promotion, port my line out of the household plan and was in a position to get an almost free yr of service on the provider the place I simply needed to pay about $6 a month in taxes. When that yr ended, I stayed on with Sprint for a number of extra months after which ported out to Verizon’s Visible for its $25-a-month plan.

I did take pleasure in a trade-in deal once I joined T-Mobile in 2021 whereas shopping for my present iPhone 12 Pro Max. The provider provided simply over $500 in invoice credit when financing a brand new iPhone by each switching to the provider and buying and selling in my Google Pixel 3 XL. It saved some huge cash, and my cellphone is now paid off, however now I’d fairly stretch the lifetime of my iPhone a number of extra years and keep away from committing to T-Mobile simply in case a greater deal comes up. What’s extra, T-Mobile now solely gives its greatest trade-in gives to clients who use their costliest Go5G plans, and I’d fairly keep grandfathered into my Magenta Max plan with a decrease price. Without altering my plan, T-Mobile’s web site claims that my iPhone 12 Pro Max might be price as a lot as $300, a far cry from the $1,000 if I agreed to lift my plan. It’s a trade-off I simply do not like. 

Verizon and Boost Mobile provide related phrases to obtain the very best trade-in credit score, and for those who can be shedding a decrease price plan to get the total credit score, it is best to do some math to see if the value distinction is price it for you. AT&T is providing its highest trade-in values for purchasers on any of the provider’s Unlimited plans, which can present some flexibility. Personally, I’d fairly lock in a decrease month-to-month price, however for those who needed to purchase a costlier plan for enhanced options, maybe the swap is sensible. 

iPhone trade-in web sites: Easy cash, however much less of it

There are many retailers and refurbished gadget web sites that supply to purchase your used gadget for money payouts. What’s particularly good about these web sites is that these rewards are offered upfront as a direct low cost on one other gadget or as straight money.

Apple itself gives a trade-in credit score when shopping for a brand new iPhone, which can be utilized in tandem with the beforehand talked about provider gives. For occasion, if I had been to commerce in my iPhone 12 Pro Max towards the price of an iPhone 16 Pro, Apple’s web site says it will provide $300 towards the value of the brand new cellphone. 

If you are not wanting particularly to purchase a brand new cellphone, you can even commerce in your gadget for money utilizing providers like Gazelle. On that web site, Gazelle says it will provide $265 for my 256GB iPhone 12 Pro Max, so long as my gadget meets the factors of showing “like new” — that means minor blemishes are acceptable.

The profit of those web sites is you could get money or credit score with out having to signal a long-term settlement with a provider, however it doesn’t imply that you do not get as beneficiant a promotion. It’s vital to notice that everytime you commerce in your gadget, the corporate you’re giving it to will probably recondition the cellphone and resell it at a fair increased revenue. If you’re keen to do some extra work, you may maximize the amount of cash you get by promoting it your self.

Selling your iPhone your self

Selling your personal cellphone requires essentially the most effort of those choices, however you may stand to achieve essentially the most cash doable in your gadget with out having to signal onto any long-term agreements with a wi-fi provider.

Websites like Swappa — a extra device-focused market — and the stalwart eBay have directions for itemizing your gadget, noting the situation and setting a worth. Both marketplaces will cost a vendor price in your itemizing; as an example, Swappa takes a 3% price whereas eBay has a scaling components. Researching the amount of cash you may get in your gadget is pretty easy, since you’ll be able to simply seek for how a lot others are promoting the identical cellphone. For occasion, in my fast search on each Swappa and eBay, different 256GB iPhone 12 Pro Max telephones are promoting within the $400 to $500 vary. 

That’s considerably increased than the quotes I obtained from Apple and Gazelle, however it finally would rely upon whether or not I’m keen to place within the work to construct the itemizing, monitor it and ship the gadget myself as soon as it sells. Picking up $500 towards a brand new cellphone — once more, while not having to signal any provider agreements — could be a worthwhile enterprise sooner or later.

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Timing will be all the pieces

Whichever choice you select to commerce in your gadget — whether or not it is by way of a provider promotion or exchanging by way of a market — bear in mind that the longer you wait, the extra your gadget ultimately depreciates. In specific, since Apple reduces the prices of earlier iPhone fashions each September, it is fairly probably that your gadget’s worth will drop round that point yearly.

If you’re banking on a profitable provider promotion, these values may also depreciate or depart completely as time goes on. For occasion, the $1,000 trade-in promotion I discussed earlier is barely accessible when utilizing an iPhone 12 Pro mannequin or newer. If you’re nonetheless holding onto an iPhone 11 Pro or earlier, you will probably obtain a a lot decrease trade-in estimate from a provider or a trade-in web site. It’s not a nasty factor to carry onto older iPhone fashions that had been first bought in 2018 or later as they’re nonetheless getting software program updates like iOS 18, however the probabilities of getting an excellent trade-in promotion or excessive promoting worth will turn out to be more difficult.