AppleCare+ Prices For iPhone 6s, iPhone 6s Plus Go Up

Yikes. Mobile users are who are planning to purchase Apple’s newest iPhone models -- the iPhone 6s and the iPhone 6s Plus -- will have to pay $129 in order to avail of AppleCare+ support for their new devices. The $129 price has increased by $30 compared to the $99 that was usually charged for previous iPhone versions, including the iPhone 6. AppleCare+ offers repair or replacement coverage from technicians authorized by Apple, and covers both for labor and for components. Customers can choose to avail of AppleCare+ upon buying an iPhone or within a couple of months from the date of purchase. 

As indicated on the page for AppleCare+ specifically for the just recently unveiled iPhones, the new price is shown together with standard information regarding what AppleCare+ offers for owners of Apple’s smartphones. As for the AppleCare+ page for the iPhone 6 and older iphone versions, the price displayed is still at the regular $99.

Many an Apple user may be wondering: what is the reason for the change in pricing? Apple had announced the iPhone 6s and the iPhone 6s Plus just this week during its September 9 event held in the city of San Francisco, California. While the new iPhones basically retain most of the same features and qualities of their predecessors, they do come with a few enhancements here and there, most noticeably in the improved chip and boosted camera specifications, just to name a few. But these are not major upgrades, so why is the AppleCare+ pricing increasing by one third of the original cost? Sure, the new iPhones do feature a new 3D Touch functionality, but does that warrant the extra $30 charge?

For those not updated yet, the 3D Touch feature in the latest iPhone models basically allow mobile users to operate their smartphone’s display screen using a variety of pressure sensitive interactions, which expands greatly on the simple tap and swipe gestures normally performed by people. Certainly, 3D Touch is a vastly sophisticated piece of new technology that Apple has incorporated in its newest smartphones. It may be reasonable to expect this feature to account for a difference in AppleCare+ pricing, but $30 per device may be asking too much for some customers.

And there is more -- it appears that the service fees for the new iPhones have also increased. As seen on the AppleCare+ page for the iPhone 6s and the iPhone 6s Plus, service fees are now at $99. For the previous models, the iPhone 6 and the iPhone 6 Plus, the service fees are at $79, which also applies to earlier iPhone versions.