The End of Ownership: Why Circular Consumption Is the Future of Tech
by Kilian Kaminski, on Sep 22, 2026
Buying a phone should be a pretty simple transaction. You choose a model, you pay for it, and from that point on, it's yours to use for as long as you want.
Except that's not quite how it works anymore.
Some of that control is already gone before the transaction even happens: manufacturers decide how repairable a device is by design, from how easily the battery can be replaced to which spare parts are available. And after the sale, they continue to shape its lifetime through software support and the price of repairs. We've become so used to these limits that they barely seem unusual. But when a replacement part costs almost as much as another device, repair may technically be an option. In practice, it isn't much of a choice.
For years, we've accepted this as the price of innovation. But it comes with an uncomfortable truth: we don't really own our tech in the way we think we do.
The Right to Repair – and the Loophole That Remains
Europe has started to correct that imbalance. From 31 July 2026, the EU's Right to Repair rules require member states to make repair easier and more accessible, giving consumers back some of the control they should have had in the first place.
But there is a catch. Spare parts must be available at a "reasonable price", without the rules defining what reasonable actually means. A manufacturer can make a part available, comply on paper, and still charge enough to make repair a bad deal. That's a pretty significant loophole in a law designed to make repair the easier choice.
And the rules are only as good as their enforcement. Implementation remains uneven across Europe. The framework is there; whether it actually changes the economics of repair is the test that matters.
Consumers Aren't Waiting for the Industry to Change
While regulation has long lagged behind the environmental need to keep devices in use for longer, consumers are already finding their own way around a system built to favour buying new: they're questioning the upgrade cycle itself.
Refurbishment won't stop a manufacturer from ending software support. But it does challenge the idea that the industry's upgrade cycle should automatically become ours. A new smartphone hitting the market doesn't make the previous one any less capable. Sometimes, something as small as changing the battery is enough to keep a perfectly good phone running for years longer.
And the economics are increasingly hard to ignore. When a new flagship costs well above 1,000€ and the difference between generations is incremental, refurbished starts looking like common sense. Research from the Vodafone Institute, Wuppertal Institute and Kantar found that 37% of Gen Z have bought refurbished devices, compared with 18% of baby boomers. Half of Gen Z plan to buy their next smartphone refurbished; among baby boomers, it's 30%.
That's a pretty clear generational shift, and it matters beyond refurbished itself. It suggests that for younger consumers, buying new is no longer the automatic default it once was. Refurbished is becoming a normal part of how they buy tech, extending the useful life of devices beyond a single ownership cycle. And the more normal that becomes, the less power the industry's launch calendar has to dictate when a perfectly good device should be replaced.
When the Old Model Stops Adding Up
Put it all together, and the old model becomes increasingly difficult to defend.
Regulation is pushing for repairability, something we at refurbed have been advocating for through our work with EUREFAS. Flagship prices are making new harder to justify in this economy. And a generation of consumers increasingly sees refurbished as a normal way to buy tech.
The industry's upgrade cycle is under pressure from all sides. And one thing is becoming clear: circular consumption isn't the future because it's the more virtuous choice. It's the future because the old model is simply running out of reasons to exist.
