A used phone can be a bargain, or it can be someone else’s problem handed to you at full price. In the workshop we see both every week: phones that were checked properly and phones that were bought on trust, then brought in for a screen, a battery and a charging port in the same visit. Five minutes of checks before you pay will tell you which one you are holding.
1. The screen
Open a plain white image and a plain dark one, and look for dead pixels, bright spots and uneven colour. Then drag an app icon slowly around the whole screen. If it drops or jumps in one area, the touch layer is failing there. A screen that looks fine at a glance can still need a full replacement, and the screen is usually the most expensive part of a phone to replace.
2. Battery health
Check the battery health reading in settings and watch how fast the percentage falls while you use the phone for a few minutes. A tired battery is a routine repair, but it is still a repair bill you should have factored into the price, not discovered on the way home.
3. Face ID and cameras
Test Face ID, the front camera and every rear camera, including video. Face ID faults are often tied to a previous drop or a poor-quality earlier repair, and they are not always fixable with a simple part swap. Blurry or flickering cameras point the same way.
4. Wi-Fi and cellular
Connect to Wi-Fi, make a call if you can, and check that mobile data works. A phone that only works on Wi-Fi may have antenna or board damage, and that is a very different job from a screen swap.
5. iCloud or Google lock status
Ask the seller to sign out of iCloud or their Google account in front of you, and check that no activation lock remains. A locked phone can be unusable no matter how good the hardware is, and no repair shop can legitimately unlock it for you.
6. Water-damage indicators
Check the charging port and SIM tray for corrosion, discolouration or a musty smell, and ask directly whether the phone has ever been in water. Water damage can take weeks to show up as random restarts or dead buttons, long after the sale.
7. Buttons and charging port
Press every button, plug in a cable and confirm it charges firmly without wiggling. A loose port or a dead button sounds small, but both mean opening the phone up, and on some models the port repair is fiddly and time-consuming.
Takeaway
Never pay before running the checks. A five-minute check costs you nothing; skipping it can cost you a repair bill that wipes out the saving you thought you were making.
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