The Implosion of Repairability
Planned obsolescence strategies extend far beyond merely timing a component failure or withholding a software update; they actively sabotage the consumer’s ability to repair products. This systematic creation of barriers dismantles the historical “fix-it culture” and reinforces the “throw-away society”. Manufacturers often ensure that repairs are not cost-effective, time-consuming, or virtually impossible for consumers and independent technicians to perform. The intention is clear: make buying new seem simpler and cheaper than fixing old, creating a condition known as economic obsolescence, where the cost of repair is prohibitive compared to replacement.
This practice has serious implications, as roughly 77% of European citizens expressed a preference for repairing their goods rather than buying new ones, but are discouraged by repair costs and service quality. For consumers, particularly those with lower incomes, expensive and difficult repairs place greater financial pressure on them, as they are left with no choice but to repurchase items that broke easily.
European citizens prefer repairing goods over buying new, but are discouraged by high repair costs
The Thesis of Engineered Inaccessibility
Manufacturers deliberately design products to be low in repairability by limiting the availability of essential spare parts, obscuring technical information, and constructing devices in ways that require specialized tools or authorization. This engineered inaccessibility functions as a comprehensive strategy to maintain control over the product lifecycle and the lucrative aftermarkets, ensuring that the primary source of replacement and maintenance profit flows back to the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) or their authorized centers.
The Analytical Core: The Trifecta of Obstacles
Foundation: Physical and Digital Design Barriers
Manufacturers intentionally assemble products in ways that discourage or actively prevent consumer and third-party repair. Physical barriers include using excessive glue, proprietary bolts, or soldering components together, making disassembly difficult without causing damage. For example, modern iPhones utilize sophisticated microprocessor chips in their batteries since the iPhone XS in 2018 to monitor performance. If a consumer attempts to replace the battery themselves or uses an unauthorized third-party repair shop, the phone displays a constant, distressing warning message, effectively discouraging practices not profitable for Apple’s licensed repair shops.
Further specialized tactics involve proprietary fasteners, such as Apple’s “tamper-resistant” pentalobe screws used in iPhones, which cannot easily be removed with common household tools. This approach aims to frustrate repairs, leading critics to argue it is an attempt to prevent owners from servicing their own devices. In complex appliances like front-loading washing machines, critical, wear-prone components like the drum bearing are sometimes permanently molded into the wash drum, making repair impossible without replacing the entire, highly expensive drum, thus forcing the device to be scrapped.
The Crucible of Context: Withholding Information and Spare Parts
A critical barrier to repair is the lack of accessible repair manuals and technical information. For many products, the availability of parts is strictly limited in time or the parts are priced so high that repairs are not cost-effective. Some manufacturers make their repair services intentionally difficult to access, demanding significant time and energy from the consumer. This is exacerbated by the loss of traditional repair skills in society, as the information needed to perform repairs—the manuals—disappears.
The struggle over proprietary information led to companies like Toshiba being criticized for issuing cease-and-desist letters to websites hosting their copyrighted repair manuals, damaging the independent and home repair market. This proprietary control extends to consumables; inkjet printer manufacturers use smart chips in cartridges that prevent use after a certain threshold, even if usable ink remains. Class action suits revealed that manufacturers like Epson and HP employed strategies where a “smart chip” would indicate the cartridge needed replacement long before it was actually empty, rendering printers inoperable even for tasks that didn’t require ink. In 2021, Canon disabled the scanning function of some all-in-one printers whenever an ink cartridge was depleted, requiring cartridge replacement even for non-printing tasks.
Cascade of Effects: Consumer Financial Strain and E-Waste
The combined forces of design barriers, high costs, and lack of information lead directly to consumer frustration and environmental harm. Consumers report feeling “priced out” of circular consumption; research shows that high repair costs were the most common reason consumers opted not to repair faulty items like laptops and washing machines. In the case of dishwashers and vacuum cleaners, consumers often determined the device was simply not worth the cost of repair.
This acceleration of discarding, driven by repair prevention, directly fuels the rapidly increasing global electronic waste (e-waste) crisis. The waste stream generated by prematurely discarded products contains significant volumes of permanent toxins, such as heavy metals, which contaminate water, air, and soil if carelessly disposed of. This practice directly opposes the environmental goal of waste prevention through reuse and repair. Consumers are left with sunk costs and contribute to premature e-waste, undermining trust in the digital economy.
Restoration Requires Design and Information Transparency
The dismantling of the fix-it culture is a calculated corporate outcome achieved by minimizing durability while maximizing repair difficulty and cost. The use of proprietary parts, glued assemblies, and software locks creates a formidable wall around products, forcing the replacement cycle to accelerate. Restoring a culture of repair requires policy responses that mandate manufacturers to provide essential repair instructions and spare parts, making repair economical and feasible again, thereby countering the fundamental strategy of planned inaccessibility.