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Repair information, troubleshooting tips, and guides for the sixth iteration of Apple iPhone, announced on September 12, 2012. Model: A1428, A1429

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iPhone 5 Screen Pricing Increase

I have noticed that within the past few months, prices for the iPhone 5 screen have almost doubled, no matter which supplier website I look at (e.g. eBay, AliExpress, or DHGate). Prices for other parts seem to have remained the same.

Does anybody know the reason for this? Is it artificial price fixing by the manufacturers?

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Jughead, this is caused by simple supply and demand. It is harder to copy the screens for the aftermarket coupled with Apple now offering to repair their own screens for very competitive prices. This will make it more expensive to get any of the LCD's for the newer iPhone's. I predict that this will last and worsen with the next generations of iPhone's.

Update (10/09/2015)

Even companies like Apple did find out that there is money to be made from replacing displays. Read this article. This will also give Apple control off what happens to the glass damaged LCD's ;-) Apple has authorized 3 manufacturers to make their LCD's (LG, Sharp, and Samsung) and they are using a technology that the Chinese manufacturers can not copy and don't have the manufacturing capabilities to make the LCD. However, Chinese manufacturers can make the backlight, attached to the LCD's. 20-25% of the LCD in China come from refurbishing a broken glass LCD assembly. Since Apple has tightened the security in their supply chain, the factories are relying on those broken screens. There is currently a shortage of the iPhone (Yes the iPhone 5) screens. Demand and supply dictate the price, even on phones that are as old as the iPhone 5 :-)

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I'm talking about the iPhone 5, which is already three years old—hardly new.

I am interested in why, very suddenly, prices have doubled. I doubt it was because of Apple's own repair services, because at US $129, they are much more expensive than what third parties offered.

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There are lots of theories around. The best I've heard is from Luke Piper, and American living in China and professionally refurbishing screens.

In short, for the iPhone 5 series screens, the main source was a "leak" in the Apple supply chain. Apple busted a Chinese group that was responsible for the leak and it dried up. That happened at the same time that the manufacturing businesses had switched over to the iPhone 6, which created a sustained dip in supply.

Luke's forecast is that ever inventive China will figure out how to capitalize on this price increase and we will see supply increase after Chinese New Year (Feb), which will gradually drive prices back down.

The spike in iPhone 6 assemblies (in Luke's opinion) was due to refurbishing folks worldwide who realized that the 6s uses the same LCD. Therefore, it makes sense to hang onto their stock and refurbish cracked 6 screens into 6s screens and wait to sell when the market is very high just after the new phone releases.

This too will gradually come back into equilibrium as the 6s screen price drops.

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I too have been wondering why these screens have gone up, by 20%. Wondering when the prices will go down. Hearing all kinds of outlandish reasons. Dealing with Apple, what can I say?

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Yeah, but those look like very spare parts. All the sections are labeled "spare parts". I couldn't find any lcd/digitizer assemblies. Great site, though. Great prices

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To my knowledge it is 2 thing. 1 Apple has tighter the security in their supply chain and now the factories are relying on the 20-25% of the material coming in from broken screens. Or option 2 is that Apple has put a stress on the factories to manufacture more LCD's for the launch of the iPhone 6s and iPhone 6c and 6s plus. So the factories don't have time to make extra material when Apple is on their tail. If you in badly need for iPhone 5 screens I recommend you to check hcqs.cc. They are offering high quality copy iPhone 5 screens now.

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Jughead will be eternally grateful.
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