iPhone Air is Losing Its Resale Value at a Record Pace

It seems that the iPhone Air won't exorcize the ghost of the fourth iPhone. After two commercial failures in the form of iPhone mini series and iPhone Plus series, it seems that the iPhone Air will follow the same path. In fact, it could be even worse and become one of Apple's biggest flops in recent years. The device's weak sales have been reported, and now it seems that even the phone's resale value is the worst in years.

A new report from SellCell analyzed the depreciation of the iPhone 17 series value based on the trade-in price over time. The report considers 40 US-based buyback companies over ten weeks. Based on the data, the iPhone Air has already lost between 40.3% and 47.7 of its initial value, depending on the storage trim.

The 256GB base model iPhone Air has an MSRP of $999. Now, however, it is 40.3% cheaper on the used market. The 512GB trim with a $1,199 MSRP lost 45% of its inital value, while the 1TB model, which retails for $1,399. In other words, it's possible to grab the 1TB option with about $668 in the used market, that's a 47.7% difference. Interestingly, the iPhone 16 Plus with 128GB of storage lost a similar 41.6% of its initial value for the same ten-week period last year. The vanilla 128GB iPhone was sitting at -44.2% for the same period.

It is worth noting that the remaining iPhone 17 series is outperforming its predecessors in terms of value. They're reaching about 34.6% depreciation for the ten weeks. The 256GB version of the iPhone 17 Pro is the best performer, losing only 26.1% of its initial price. The 256GB iPhone 17 Pro, on the other hand, lost 32% of its value for the same period. The base 256GB iPhone 17 is in a similar spot at -33%.