{"id":46617,"date":"2025-02-03T16:24:55","date_gmt":"2025-02-03T21:24:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/?p=46617"},"modified":"2026-03-19T11:00:29","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T15:00:29","slug":"applecare-only-as-a-subscription","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/2025\/02\/03\/applecare-only-as-a-subscription\/","title":{"rendered":"AppleCare+ Only As a Subscription"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.macrumors.com\/2025\/02\/02\/applecare-plus-policy-change-at-apple-stores\/\">Joe Rossignol<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote cite=\"https:\/\/www.macrumors.com\/2025\/02\/02\/applecare-plus-policy-change-at-apple-stores\/\"><p>Starting next week, Apple&rsquo;s retail stores will no longer offer AppleCare+ plans as a one-time purchase, according <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/markgurman\/status\/1886083012967948722\">to <em>Bloomberg<\/em>&rsquo;s Mark Gurman<\/a>.<\/p><p>Instead, he said the stores will only offer AppleCare+ as a subscription.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n<p>It was already <em>available<\/em> as a subscription, so the main effect of this change seems to be to remove the discount for purchasing multiple years up front.<\/p>\n\n<p>Previously:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/2022\/09\/08\/applecare-unlimited-repairs\/\">AppleCare+ Unlimited Repairs<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/2021\/05\/05\/extended-mac-applecare-coverage\/\">Extended Mac AppleCare+ Coverage<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/2018\/11\/15\/applecares-limited-duration\/\">AppleCare&rsquo;s Limited Duration<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/2019\/09\/13\/applecare-indefinite-subscriptions\/\">AppleCare+ Indefinite Subscriptions<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n<p id=\"applecare-only-as-a-subscription-update-2025-02-10\">Update (2025-02-10): <a href=\"https:\/\/micro.adamchandler.me\/2025\/02\/07\/wait-i-thought-applecare-was.html\">Adam<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/micro.adamchandler.me\/2025\/02\/07\/wow-so-if-you-click.html\">Chandler<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote cite=\"https:\/\/micro.adamchandler.me\/2025\/02\/07\/wait-i-thought-applecare-was.html\">\n<p>I thought AppleCare was only changing for retail customers but it appears Apple Store online only offers monthly or annual now when just last week you could pay for 3 years<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n<blockquote cite=\"https:\/\/micro.adamchandler.me\/2025\/02\/07\/wow-so-if-you-click.html\">\n<p>Wow. So if you click &ldquo;monthly or annually&rdquo; it now pops up a box after you click &ldquo;checkout&rdquo; given you a 3rd choice of 3 years.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n<p id=\"applecare-only-as-a-subscription-update-2026-03-19\">Update (<a href=\"#applecare-only-as-a-subscription-update-2026-03-19\">2026-03-19<\/a>): <a href=\"https:\/\/adamchandler.me\/blog\/2026\/03\/13\/heres-how-you-purchase-3-years-of-applecare-for-your-new-macbook-or-macbook-pro-m5\/\">Adam Chandler<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote cite=\"https:\/\/adamchandler.me\/blog\/2026\/03\/13\/heres-how-you-purchase-3-years-of-applecare-for-your-new-macbook-or-macbook-pro-m5\/\">\n<p>What about 3-years of coverage? That used to be a thing, right?<\/p>\n<p>It was <strong>AND <\/strong>it still is!<\/p>\n<p>You can&rsquo;t buy it from Apple.com or at the retail store. You can still visit an Apple Authorized Reseller like BestBuy or B&amp;H Photo or your local reseller and they can attach the SKU to your computer. Today in 2026, that price is $399. It used to be $299 but&#8230;.inflation. <\/p>\n<p>Alternatively, you can reach out to Apple&rsquo;s customer support at 1-800-275-2273. I spoke to 3 representatives over 2 days but finally, someone was willing to spend 35 minutes on the phone for me and do some digging.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>For his Mac, he says it works out to $11.08\/month vs. $14.99\/month paying monthly, and you can get a pro-rata refund if you want to cancel the plan early.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Joe Rossignol: Starting next week, Apple&rsquo;s retail stores will no longer offer AppleCare+ plans as a one-time purchase, according to Bloomberg&rsquo;s Mark Gurman.Instead, he said the stores will only offer AppleCare+ as a subscription. It was already available as a subscription, so the main effect of this change seems to be to remove the discount [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"apple_news_api_created_at":"2025-02-03T21:24:58Z","apple_news_api_id":"fbe815b2-03dc-432b-88f7-867558043708","apple_news_api_modified_at":"2026-03-19T15:00:33Z","apple_news_api_revision":"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAg==","apple_news_api_share_url":"https:\/\/apple.news\/A--gVsgPcQyuI94Z1WAQ3CA","apple_news_coverimage":0,"apple_news_coverimage_caption":"","apple_news_is_hidden":false,"apple_news_is_paid":false,"apple_news_is_preview":false,"apple_news_is_sponsored":false,"apple_news_maturity_rating":"","apple_news_metadata":"\"\"","apple_news_pullquote":"","apple_news_pullquote_position":"","apple_news_slug":"","apple_news_sections":"\"\"","apple_news_suppress_video_url":false,"apple_news_use_image_component":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2250,416,452,31,145,30],"class_list":["post-46617","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technology","tag-apple-services","tag-applecare","tag-hardware","tag-ios","tag-ipad","tag-mac"],"apple_news_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46617","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46617"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46617\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":51298,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46617\/revisions\/51298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}