iPhone Screen Repair Birmingham: What It Costs and How Long It Takes (2026 Guide)

You drop your phone once on a kerb in town. You pick it up. The top half of the screen looks like a spider's web. Welcome to the most common repair we do at our Hockley lab, and in most cases you'll have a flawless display back the same day.

This is what an iPhone screen repair actually costs in 2026, why prices stretch so wide between models, and what to expect when you bring one in.

How much does an iPhone screen repair cost in Birmingham?

Our iPhone screen repairs start from £49. They scale up by model. Older LCD-equipped phones (XR, 11) sit at the bottom of the range. Pro models with the 120 Hz LTPO OLED panels Apple introduced on the 14 Pro sit at the top, because those panels are the most expensive parts in Apple's bill of materials.

Rather than maintain a model-by-model price list that goes stale every September, we keep the live numbers on the quote tool:

Get a free quote for your exact iPhone in 30 seconds →

You'll see lower quotes elsewhere on Soho Road or down the indoor market. The next section is about why that gap exists, and why it matters.

Why prices vary so much between models

Three things drive the cost.

First, display technology. A basic LCD (iPhone 11, XR) is cheap to source. OLED panels cost Apple more to make, and us more to buy. The ProMotion LTPO panels in Pro models are the priciest screens we fit, by a long way.

Second, Face ID complexity. From iPhone X onwards, the screen assembly carries a flex cable for the proximity sensor and earpiece that has to be paired to your phone. Get it wrong and Face ID is dead for good. We use a chip programmer to re-pair the original sensor flex to the new display. Most budget shops don't have one. That's why so many of their customers leave with the "Face ID not available" message and no way to fix it.

Third, the True Tone chip. Every original Apple display has a tiny chip soldered to it that tells the phone what colour temperature to render. Transfer it to the new panel and True Tone keeps working. Skip that step and it's gone forever. We do it. Budget shops usually don't.

How long does it take?

Most iPhone screen swaps take 30 to 90 minutes in our Birmingham lab. Walk-ins are welcome, but a booked slot guarantees a tech is at the bench when you arrive.

A few things can stretch that out.

iPhone 14 Pro and 15 Pro onwards take a little longer, because the back-glass assembly is involved in the disassembly. If the phone landed flat on concrete and the frame is bent, that needs straightening before the new display will sit flush. Add 20 to 30 minutes. And if the touch layer is gone entirely, we may need you to unlock the phone (with your passcode) so we can run the post-repair test cycle.

If you can't wait, we do drop-off and pickup, or post-in and post-back. Plenty of customers from outside Birmingham courier their phones to us overnight.

Book a 30-minute slot at our Hockley lab →

Original vs aftermarket screens

There are ads online for iPhone screen replacements at £25. Here's what's almost always actually being fitted.

A "copy LCD". A third-party LCD panel made to look like the original. It sort of works. Lower brightness, washed-out colours, slower touch. On an iPhone that came with OLED, the difference is jarring. About half the people who ask us to redo a cheap copy screen are doing it because they're sick of how the phone looks.

A refurbished OLED. The original panel lifted from another phone (often one that was water-damaged, ironically), re-glassed, and resold. Can look fine for a while. Tends to develop dead spots or yellowing within six months.

A pulled OEM. Exactly what it sounds like: a real Apple part scavenged from another iPhone. Quality is identical to original on day one. You just have no idea how long the phone it came from spent in a back pocket.

We use OEM-grade panels by default. Pulled OEMs are available on request for flagship models. Either way, we tell you what's going in, and the work is covered by our lifetime craftsmanship warranty.

What about insurance and AppleCare+?

If you have AppleCare+, your screen repair has a fixed accidental-damage service fee. Apple publishes the current figure on their support site, and it's well below out-of-warranty pricing. Without AppleCare+, the Apple Store's out-of-warranty rate for a Pro-model screen runs into the hundreds. By some margin more than our price for the same job.

Home insurance with accidental-damage cover sometimes pays out for phones, but read the excess. It's usually £100+, and a claim will affect your no-claims discount. For most cracked screens, paying us directly is cheaper.

What to do right now if your iPhone screen is cracked

1. Stop pressing on the broken glass. If shards have started coming loose, put a strip of clear tape across the screen before you do anything else.
2. Back up the phone. Even if it's still working. See our backup guide for a 5-minute version.
3. Get a quote. Tell us the model and we'll send back a fixed price in seconds.
4. Book a slot, or just walk in. We're at 85b Hockley Street, B19 3DL, open until 18:30 weekdays and 17:00 on Saturdays.

FAQs

Will my Face ID still work after the screen is replaced? Yes, as long as the repairer transfers the original earpiece/proximity flex and pairs the sensor chip. That's our default. If a shop skips that step, Face ID stops working permanently. There's no software fix for it.

Will I lose True Tone? Not with us. We transfer the True Tone chip to the new panel so auto-colour-temperature keeps working.

Does fitting a new screen reset the phone? No. Your photos, apps and settings are all on the storage chip, which we don't touch. We still recommend a backup before any repair, because anything mechanical can have an unlucky day.

What if my phone won't turn on after the drop? That's not always the screen. Sometimes the impact dislodges a battery connector or damages the power button flex. We diagnose it for free. If it's a board-level problem, we'll tell you up front.

Do you offer a warranty? Yes. A lifetime craftsmanship warranty on every screen repair. If the touch stops working, colour bands appear, or the backlight dies, we replace it free. New impact damage is a fresh repair.

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Cracked your screen? You don't need to live with it another day. Get a free quote for your iPhone model, or book a 30-minute slot at our Birmingham lab.