A cracked screen or a battery that won't last past lunch is usually the moment the question gets asked: is it worth repairing your phone, or is this the nudge to finally replace it? With new handsets regularly priced above £700 in 2026, the answer is worth working out properly rather than guessing.

What repair actually costs

Most common phone faults - a broken screen, a dying battery, a faulty charging port - are single-component repairs. They typically cost a small fraction of a new device, and everything else (storage, camera, chip, your apps and settings) stays exactly as you left it.

What replacement actually costs

A new phone isn't just the sticker price. There's the setup time, transferring data and accounts, replacing accessories that no longer fit, and - if you're on a contract - the ongoing monthly cost of financing it.

When replacement genuinely makes sense

If your phone won't hold a charge and the screen is cracked and it's several years past its last software update, repair stops making sense - you'd be patching a device failing on multiple fronts at once. That's the point to weigh a new device fairly.

The simple test

For a single fault, repair almost always wins on cost. For multiple, compounding faults, it's worth a real comparison - so get an accurate repair price before assuming replacement is cheaper. It rarely is.

Repatch makes that comparison easy: book a repair, a courier collects your phone from home or work, a technician diagnoses and fixes it, and it's returned to you - often within 2 hours.