“How much is my Mac worth?” It’s not an easy question to answer, which leads to some attractively mispriced deals on the secondhand market. Pros and cons of buying Apple laptops secondhand In case you’ve searched for your perfect MacBook everywhere and found nothing, you could just expose yourself to a little bit more risk for a lot more choice - by buying secondhand. Some of them might not have up-to-date websites, but their low profile could yield you a great deal that can’t be found elsewhere. Big retailers like Best Buy and Amazon often offer their own refurbished deals on a regular basis.Īnother option is to look for certified Apple resellers in your area. If you don’t see what you’re looking for in the Apple Refurbished Store, don’t worry - there are other options too. The only hiccup with refurbished MacBooks is that you can’t return them to the physical Apple Store nearby, but have to ship them back instead.
It’s extremely unlikely that you can get a deal on a refurbished MacBook Pro that has just been released.īuying from the Apple Refurbished Store is exactly the same as buying from their regular online store - same process, same checkout - you might even combine refurbished and regular products in one shopping cart. Most of the refurbished products are likely to be one to two years old. If you don’t see what you like but you’re not in a hurry, check back occasionally for a good deal to come up. Simply go to /shop/refurbished and take a look at the inventory they currently carry. Your first stop - Apple Refurbished Store, which means buying directly from Apple. The only issue here is that not all the models and configurations are available at any given time - so shopping around a few stores might be wise. Since you now know that refurbished Apple laptops are identical to new ones but cheaper, you might want to look into buying one. It also covers a few instances of accidental damage, so you wouldn’t start tearing out your hair after a spilled cup of coffee.įinally, let’s walk through how and where to buy, for example, a MacBook Pro refurbished. Additionally, there’s an option to purchase AppleCare+, which costs around $300 and extends the coverage to three years instead of one.
Whether you choose the Apple refurbished MacBook Pro or refurbished MacBook Air, it would come with a standard one-year warranty and 90 days of free technical support that covers all Apple devices, and you can return it for free within 14 days as well. Ok, so getting your iMac or MacBook refurbished is cheaper without giving up any quality in the process. Can you return refurbished iMacs and MacBooks? You could even say that Apple refurbished products are more reliable, since they go through all the testing twice. Put through Apple’s Finished Goods testing, the same process as all other Apple devices Updated to the most recent operating system, when available Repackaged with new manuals, cables, and boxes Any defective parts are replaced.Ĭleaned and inspected for any physical damage They are:Ĭhecked during the functionality testing. Refurbished Apple laptops are functionally not different from any brand new products. Is a refurbished MacBook Pro in some way dysfunctional? It might be that the word “refurbished” itself now carries a bit of a negative connotation. What’s the difference between refurbished vs new?Įven people who’ve heard about the Apple Refurbished Store often remain skeptical. Why buy refurbished MacBooks at all? You could save up to 15%. For some other brands, refurbished might mean unsold stock, but Apple’s production is synced up with the demand so well that it’s rarely the case. This could be a MacBook Air with a sticky key, a powerful iMac Pro that the original buyer simply didn’t feel comfortable with and sent back within 14 days of purchasing, or a floor model of a MacBook Pro from the Apple Store. Refurbished essentially applies to any products that were returned to the manufacturer for any reason. But what does refurbished mean exactly? How does it differ from used or discounted products? You might have heard the term “refurbished” before. If only there was a way to buy them cheaper! Luckily, there is - it’s called Apple Certified Refurbished Store. While Macs might be the most beautiful computers on the planet, they are also among the most expensive ones, setting you back anywhere from $1,000 to over $10,000 for top performance models. What usually stops us from getting the newest one? Price. We all love Macs - those powerful and easy-to-use laptops and desktop computers with iconic design that somehow keeps getting better and better every year.