iFixit is Starting the iPhone XR Teardown Treatment

BY Evan Selleck

Published 26 Oct 2018

iFixit starts the iPhone XR teardown

The iPhone XR officially went on sale starting today, October 26. So it shouldn’t come as a surprise that the crew over at iFixit have started tearing the new colorful iPhone apart (for science!).

The first steps of the iPhone XR teardown are now live on the site, showing just how to take apart the new iPhone as carefully as possible. The teardown is going on right now, with updates happening live and as they are discovered. At the time of publication, iFixit is currently on step 5. It’s here that the publication states that the inside of the new smartphone is “a fun hybrid between the [iPhone] 8 and the X”.

As is par for the course with this live updating teardown, the team have plenty of insights along the way, but things change as more parts are shifted around and moved. For instance, there is this bit from the fifth step of the process, as the rectangular logic board and battery are exposed:

  • Inside, the XR starts to look more like a fun hybrid between the 8 and the X. We’re back to a rectangular battery, but there’s also a rectangular logic board.
  • The question is: How many layers does that logic board have?
  • At first glance, we’re surprised by the large gap above the battery—older iPhones have a strip of logic board that inhabits this space, but since that’s been trimmed up, why not take up that extra space with more battery?
  • At second glance, we realize that space is taken up by the display-mounted earpiece speaker, just like in the other X-series iPhones.

The full teardown is happening now, so if you’re interested in seeing the internals of the iPhone XR, and how they might compare to the insides of the iPhone XS, then head through the source link below and follow along.

[via iFixit]