The Best Places to Buy and Sell a Used iPhone

The Best Places to Purchase and Sell a Used iPhone

Glyde, Swappa Top Our iPhone Reseller Rankings

With Apple tree now taking orders for the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus, many people will wait to sell their sometime iPhone for some quick cash. Merely which places offering the best render and the smoothest process? To discover out, Tom's Guide tested seven services that buy and sell used iPhones.

To find out where you can expect the best return on your dollar, we bought an iPhone from each reseller service and then turned effectually and re-sold that phone to same service where it came from. We besides rated each service on their convenience, ease of use and responsiveness to come upwards with our rankings.

The key takeaways from our testing:

* Glyde and Swappa summit our rankings of the all-time places to buy and sell a used telephone.

* Walmart and Best Buy finished at the lesser.

* We resold our iPhones for an average of 52 percent of what we had paid for them.

* We got the highest charge per unit of render from marketplace services that connect smartphone buyers with sellers; the worst render came from big-box retailers.

How We Tested

To best measure out how much return you tin expect from iPhone resellers, we selected services that both buy and sell used iPhones, evaluating seven. In addition to Glyde and Swappa, we as well looked at Amazon, Best Buy, GameStop, Gazelle and Walmart. We bought a used iPhone from each service, and then — without activating or using our newly purchased phone — sold the aforementioned model back to the seller where we purchased information technology.

From most resellers, we bought a 16GB iPhone 6. We purchased a 16GB iPhone 6 Plus from Amazon and GameStop due to availability issues, though we stuck with iPhones released in 2014 to get comparable quotes from resellers. Also, due to availability, some of the iPhones nosotros purchased were tied to specific carriers, which we've noted beneath. In our experience, unlocked phones not tied to any 1 carrier generally fetch higher prices (though AT&T and Verizon phones have a high resale value, too).

As you might expect, there'south a gap between what resellers will charge you lot for an iPhone and what they're willing to pay out when y'all try selling that same telephone back. Merely similar with cars that depreciate the moment yous drive them off the lot, that iPhone you're hoping to unload will never recoup its value. In our testing, resellers brand their money by buying low and selling high.

When ranking these vii services, in add-on to measuring how much we got back when reselling an iPhone, nosotros too took the unabridged process into account. Were the instructions easy to follow? How quickly did it accept to become a quote on our iPhone? Did the reseller offer cash or store credit? And how promptly did we receive that greenbacks or credit afterward completing the auction?

Glyde: Our Tiptop Choice

What We Bought: Space Grayness iPhone six (AT&T)
What We Paid: $359.50
What We Got Back: $265.60
Charge per unit of Return: 74 percent
Greenbacks or Credit: Cash and bitcoin
Pros: Best rate of return; Clear explanation of policies with explicit breakdown of fees; Choice to await for a better price; Can verify your identity via PayPal; Flexible payment options
Cons: You're not required to post a verification photo, a step that tin can help weed out scammers.

Glyde offers a straightforward, colorful and like shooting fish in a barrel-to-navigate website where you can detect an assortment of second-manus iPhones besides as Android models from Samsung, HTC, LG and others. To sell my iPhone vi, all I needed to do was select the website'southward Sell tab and type in the phone'due south model number, carrier, color and status. Several questions from Glyde covered details about physical appearance and scratches, personalization, and whether I had included accessories like a power adapter and cable.

Note that prices tin can alter, ofttimes from day to day. After trying a dry run, I went back to Glyde to re-enter information nearly the phone I was trying to sell, and the market price had dropped to $316 from $326.

The market price is what the buyer is going to pay, non the amount I would pocket. Glyde charges a 15-percent transaction fee, while a kit with packaging to ship off your phone will cost yous $3. Glyde was the most transparent service when it came to spelling out fees. I wound up collecting $265.threescore. (That amount would take been $274.10 if I had stuck with the quote from my dry run.) That's withal the highest percentage of return from any vendor we tested, as we got dorsum 74 percent of what we paid for the iPhone.

While I was disappointed with the price drop over ii days, I decided to take my turn a profit immediately and hitting the Listing for Sale button. From at that place, you type in information about the phone, enter your electronic mail and Glyde business relationship password, and verify your identity with your credit bill of fare or PayPal account. Click the button, and your item is listed. You can mail your listing on Facebook, Twitter and Google + right from Glyde'southward page.

Two days after I listed my telephone for sale, a buyer bit then reneged within an hour; Glyde notified me via electronic mail about both events. The next 24-hour interval, another person offered to purchase, which I speedily confirmed. A packing box arrived in the mail, with a prepaid label; all I had to do was drop the package into the nearest mailbox. Three days afterwards the buyer receives and accepts the telephone, Glyde posts the money into your account. From at that place, yous can transfer the cash to your bank account, opt for Bitcoin payment or accept a check mailed to you for a $ii fee.

Swappa: Runner-Up

What Nosotros Bought: Space Gray iPhone 6 (Verizon)
What We Paid: $465
What We Got Back: $325
Rate of Return: 70 pct
Cash or Credit: Cash
Pros: Posted items are approved quickly by Swappa; Power to adjust listing; Solid rate of return; Added protection via PayPal purchases
Cons: Time-consuming process required for shooting photos of your phone; Like-minded to an immediate trade will lower your rate of return; Mandatory $x PayPal transaction fee.

Swappa — as in "y'all wanna swappa?" — is an electronics website that features a fun interface for selling several dozen brands of phones, including Android devices too as the iPhone. Just type in the specific search term to find the model y'all want to sell, and if it appears, you get an firsthand idea of how much cash you'll get.

My Verizon-tied iPhone cost $465, and from the site'southward initial offer, I would have pocketed upwardly to $307 in greenbacks, which came to 66 percent of the total I paid for the device. Swappa as well gave me the choice of selling my phone for from $340 to $559 if I wanted to look for a better deal. I opted for a better return — and to take the deal, I had to register, either through Facebook or Google+ or via email and password.

It took longer to go my listing up on Swappa than it did with other sites. The process requires you to shoot a verification photo of the phone and its accessories using a specific, rather low-tech arroyo. You have to set up your shots with the site'south verification number handwritten on a piece of newspaper adjacent to the phone, and then ability up the phone you're reselling, so the screen is lit when you take your picture. You lot repeat the process with any included accessories. The idea is to foreclose scams, and Swappa at least offers ample instruction on how to accept your picture.

After I took the photos, Swappa took 15 minutes to verify and approve my entry. From there, information technology's a matter of waiting for someone to purchase your phone. If you've tried to go a college cost, you lot can revise your list to Swappa's lower toll, which I did after waiting three days. The phone sold only after I settled on a new price: $335, which netted me $325 in one case I took into business relationship a mandatory PayPal transaction fee.

That PayPal fee is the only cost — at that place's no fee to sell on Swappa — and using PayPal to handle transactions felt safer than having to punch in credit card data. Swappa reviews and approves all listings before buyers can come across them. Swappy promptly answered my questions about my listing when I sent queries via email and posted them to Swappa'due south Facebook page. When my phone sold, I was notified that money had been deposited in my PayPal business relationship, after which I had two days to mail out the telephone.

Every bit an extra added layer of protection, anyone who sells a stolen phone, or 1 with a damaged screen or water damage violates Swappa'southward terms of use, giving buyers recourse through PayPal.

Gazelle

What We Bought: Space Gray iPhone 6 (Verizon)
What We Paid: $406
What We Got Back: $210
Rate of Return: 52 percent
Greenbacks or Credit: Both
Pros: Quick and piece of cake resale process; Multiple options for getting paid for your device; Inspection process ensures quality choice of phones on sale.
Cons: Centre-of-the-road payment for trade-ins, compared to other resellers.

Gazelle has an attractive site that makes it piece of cake to become started with your sale: The company trades in iPhones and Samsung Galaxy models as well every bit Android devices from HTC, Nokia, LG and others that cover the 4 major carriers.

If yous have Gazelle's offer on your phone, you have a choice of payment via Amazon gift bill of fare (which adds an extra five per centum to your total), PayPal, charitable donation or standard check delivered within 10 days of Gazelle verifying the phone's condition. Customers buy your phone from Gazelle, not you directly, and the company inspects the device before selling information technology every bit certified pre-owned to guarantee the condition. To ensure buyers are satisfied, there is a thirty-day return policy.

Subsequently you lot enter your email accost and a minimum amount of information about the telephone's brand, capacity and physical status, you do not have to wait for a buyer — but accept the Gazelle offer, box up the phone and choose how you lot desire to be paid.

As a reseller, Gazelle will entreatment almost if you want to unload your phone rapidly and would similar some options for how you'll be reimbursed. Nosotros got dorsum only half of the value of the iPhone we had bought, though.

Amazon

What We Bought: Infinite Grey iPhone six Plus (unlocked)
What We Paid: $549.99
What We Got Dorsum: $265
Rate of Return: 48 percent
Greenbacks or Credit: Amazon souvenir card
Pros: Process is clearly explained; Merchandise-in offer is immediate; Amazon offers free mailing characterization for sending in your phone.
Cons: Prices paid are fairly low; You're restricted to store credit; Merchandise-in links can be hard to find.

To sell your old smartphone on Amazon's massive website — which appears to sell a huge variety of about every brand imaginable — requires an hawkeye eye and some clicking around to find the correct path. In the stop, typing the exact detail into Amazon'southward search box, clicking on a result and finding the trade-in link on the page was the quickest way to go an estimate.

For an iPhone vi Plus that nosotros bought for $549.99 from the eastward-commerce behemothic, Amazon offered $265 in trade — less than one-half of what nosotros paid. While your phone's advent and condition may be adequate to yous, Amazon reserves the right to inspect the device and asks straightaway if yous volition take a lower cost or if you lot want the telephone sent back if your cost and Amazon'south don't lucifer. Later on my phone passed inspection, Amazon deposited the proceeds of my gift card directly into my business relationship.

The company'due south trade-in plan offers an Amazon gift bill of fare in exchange for your used telephone. If yous don't mind registering as an Amazon seller — which involves inbound credit card and revenue enhancement info — yous can sell your telephone on Amazon'southward individual seller market place. Only that's a lot of hoops to jump through for a one-time sale, especially when the souvenir card can be used to buy whatsoever of the hundreds of thousands of things Amazon sells on its site.

GameStop

What We Bought: Space Gray iPhone 6 Plus (AT&T)
What We Paid: $459.99
What Nosotros Got Back: $240
Rate of Render: 52 percent
Cash or Credit: Both
Pros: Choice between greenbacks or shop credit; Simple procedure; In-shop staff were helpful and professional during our testing.
Cons: Middling return on the value of our telephone; Requires a visit to a brick-and-mortar store to consummate your auction.

GameStop takes a different arroyo than other resellers because of its focus on games. While some resellers offering a mix of cash and credit, GameStop customers may be more than inclined to trade in their phones for store credit in games, VR headsets and gaming systems, in addition to the refurbished iPhones and Samsung Galaxy models bachelor on the GameStop site. The transaction is straightforward except for one affair: The terminal turnover of your telephone for cash or souvenir cards must be washed in person.

The website offers a list of the telephone types GameStop accepts for merchandise. A working iPhone vi Plus that has no missing parts, cracks or dents will merchandise or get cash totaling $240. That'due south a trivial more than than 52 percent of the $459.99 nosotros had paid GameStop for the same phone the previous month. A damaged phone volition trade for $95, while a dead phone gets $25.

My trade-in experience took merely xv minutes, as the pleasant and efficient clerk backside the counter tested the phone and looked upwardly records. I walked out with a $240 gift menu.
GameStop lets you search for stores inside a 15-mile radius of your aught code. If in that location'southward no retail outlet well-nigh you, you'll want to plough to a different reseller.

Walmart

What We Bought: Space Grey iPhone 6 (Straight Talk)
What We Paid: $369
What We Got Back: $125
Rate of Render: 34 pct
Cash or Credit: Credit
Pros: Simple transaction requiring little data; Free aircraft label supplied.
Cons: Very depression render on resales; Limited to in-store credit.

You'll find plenty of phones available for sale at Walmart, including contract, unlocked and refurbished phones bachelor for the major carriers besides as the retailer'south in-house Straight Talk network. What y'all won't find is the pick to go cash back for your phone. Information technology'due south store credit and no negotiating.

Information technology's easy enough to become through the procedure, using the Gadgets for Gift Cards link. The used iPhone 6 we bought from Walmart netted a $125 offering, 34 percent of what we paid, which was the lowest return from whatever reseller. Interestingly, the phone was tied to Straight Talk. Had we tried selling back an unlocked phone or ane tied to AT&T or Verizon, Walmart would have given us $160 in credit.

Once you lot approve Walmart'south appraisement, just log in to your account or create a new account with your email and mailing accost. Walmart offers a printed label that you can use to pack up your telephone and ship it in. Afterward that, just wait for your gift menu to make it via email, which it did within three days of receiving my phone.

Best Buy

What We Bought: Space Grey iPhone 6 (AT&T)
What We Paid: $599.99
What Nosotros Got Dorsum: $208
Rate of Return: 35 pct
Cash or Credit: Gift Bill of fare
Pros: Trade-in process is elementary, if you lot accept no questions; Merchandise-ins at the store are handled efficiently by friendly staff.
Cons: Long await times for answering questions on Best Buy's 800-number; Low rate of render.

All-time Buy has a decorated website that features a vast diversity of iPhones and flavors of Android phones for sale. But it'southward still adequately easy to find the place to trade in your older iPhone. If yous do, exist prepared to have payment in credit. Similar Walmart and Amazon, All-time Buy doesn't deal in greenbacks for phone trade-ins.

We paid $599.99 for an iPhone 6 that arrived in a sealed box (for an iPhone 6s oddly) but with no earbuds included, the only used phone we bought that was missing an particular. That didn't affect my merchandise-in price; when I turned in my iPhone for resale, the Best Purchase clerk said I didn't demand to include accessories. But Best Purchase'southward offer was the second-lowest return from any reseller: just a $208 gift menu, or 35 percent of what we paid for the iPhone.

Getting a quote from Best Buy's website is unproblematic plenty. All I had to do was list the phone's colour, carrier and status to get a trade-in value that I could redeem in person or by post. Getting answers to questions proved more difficult. I called Best Buy'southward toll-free number to ask about the missing earbuds and an upshot with the phone'due south IMEI number, and waited twenty minutes and through 3 transfers before I was told it would be a better idea to do my trade-in at a store. That took a much more than efficient xv minutes.

Other options

You don't necessarily need to go through a reseller or due east-commerce marketplace to unload your aging iPhone. Certainly, Craigslist offers the opportunity to discover a willing buyer, and depending on your negotiating skills, you may be able to get a bigger return than yous would from a reseller who's going to offer y'all a set price.

That said, handling a sale on your ain can exist a hassle, and there's always the risk of running into scammers. A reseller or reputable market removes a lot of the headaches and potential risks.

If you're planning on using the coin yous get from trading in your phone to finance the purchase of a new phone and y'all're committed to a specific wireless carrier, you may want to run across what that carrier volition offer you lot for your former phone. Verizon offered u.s. the best quote on an iPhone half-dozen, with a $265 trade-in value. AT&T quoted us a price of $200 for a 16GB iPhone 6, while T-Mobile and Sprint offered $191 and $159, respectively. Those quotes presume a phone is in first-class status, and the amounts tin vary based on which carrier your old phone is tied to. You receive the trade-in value in the form of credit or a gift card.

Where to Buy a Used Phone

Our testing of reseller services focused primarily on selling a used iPhone, because that's where y'all're likely to experience the greatest amount of variance, from the coin y'all get back for your phone to the simplicity of the resale process. In contrast, shopping for a used iPhone from these sites is a pretty similar experience, though in that location are a few differences worth noting.

In terms of choice, yous'll more often than not notice each service offers a wide degree of smartphone models and capacities. In our search for a used iPhone half dozen, we found that models tied to AT&T and Verizon were plentiful while T-Mobile and Sprint devices were in shorter supply. Amazon, Glyde and Swappa offered the widest range of phones in terms of carriers and capacities.

Used iPhone shoppers will find the best range of prices at Swappa, though lower-priced phones are likely to take been well-used. Glyde, Gazelle, GameStop and Amazon too offer attractive pricing on used phones depending on what model you're looking for.

We found information technology easiest to shop for a used iPhone at Glyde and Swappa, which conveniently group iPhone models together, allowing you to drill downwards to the version y'all want. Despite its broad selection, Amazon offers very cluttered search results; blazon in iPhone 6, and you're only equally likely to become entries for the 6s, 6s Plus and 6 Plus as you are for the model you want. Walmart and Best Buy feature helpful filters for removing superfluous search results.

We should note that we ran into one quirk when buying our phones from Glyde and GameStop, though that's likely a result of how we ordered our iPhones. Because we bought our phones through our corporate office and shipped them to an editor at some other location, both Glyde and GameStop flagged our initial purchases, requiring us to gear up a PayPal account to complete the deals. About shoppers won't encounter that trouble, though information technology could flare up if y'all're buying a used phone every bit a gift for someone who has a different address than yours.

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Jackie is an obsessive, insomniac tech writer and editor in northern California. A wildlife advocate, cat fan, and photo app fanatic, her specialties include cross-platform hardware and software, art, design, photography, video, and a wide range of creative and productivity apps and systems. Formerly senior editor at Macworld and creativity editor at The Next Spider web, Jackie now writes for a variety of consumer tech publications.