Keep Above
New or used phone
A new phone against a used or refurbished one — two ways to own the same thing. Each side takes its price, what it would sell for after the years you'd keep it, its running costs, and — if it's financed — the interest, and lands on a cost per year. The sale values start from commonly cited phone depreciation figures, marked EST.; every one is an estimate you can overwrite, and no winner is ever declared.
Not counted while this is $0
Sets where it enters the depreciation curve
Not counted while this is $0
Put in what each one would cost. Nothing here is read from your budgets, and nothing is saved.
| New | Used | |
|---|---|---|
| Paid up front | — | — |
| Value lost | — | — |
| Loan interest | — | — |
| Running costs | — | — |
| Total over 5 years | — | — |
| Cost a year | — | — |
| Cost a month | — | — |
Where does a used phone's battery fit into the cost?
A phone's battery is a consumable with a finite number of charge cycles in it, so a used handset is bought partway through that count and its price reflects a battery that has already done part of its work. There is no field for a replacement: it belongs in the used side's price if it would be done straight away, or in its running costs if it would fall inside the years you would keep it. Left out of both, the used side's cost per year sits under what the handset would really take.
A used phone also starts partway through whatever software support it came with, so the years field on that side is bounded by what is left of that rather than by how long the handset would physically last. Airtime is not part of the handset and would run the same either way, which means entering it in both running-costs boxes raises both cost-per-year figures and changes the distance between them not at all.
This is one of the tools built into Keep Above
Keep Above is a budgeting app where you enter your bills and income and it works out the balance you need to keep — so you can see what's safe to spend. No bank connection, no ads on your data.
New against used resolves into a cost per year across the years something is kept — which budgeting apps forecast your balance, and how far ahead.
About this calculator
How is each side counted?
One formula for both, cash or loan: the price, plus any loan interest, plus running costs over the years you'd keep it, minus what it would sell for at the end. Selling mid-loan settles the remaining balance, and if the sale wouldn't cover it the shortfall is stated as a fact.
Where do the phone sale estimates come from?
Picking the phone category seeds both sale fields from commonly cited published depreciation ranges for phones — broad averages, marked EST., never a valuation of a particular handset. Storage size and how much software support is left are outside the average altogether, so the seeded figure describes handsets of that age and nothing narrower. Type your own figure and the estimate steps aside; "Use estimate" brings it back.
Why does the used phone have an age field?
Because a used handset joins the depreciation curve partway along: how much value the next few years would take off depends on how old it already is. No other input feeds it. A handset that has lived in a case and one with a cracked screen start from the same figure at the same age, and that difference is yours to put in.
Does a replacement battery go in the price or the running costs?
Either, depending on when it would happen. Something done before the phone is used belongs in the price, because it is part of what the handset cost to get working; something that would come up two or three years in belongs in running costs, where it is spread across the years you would keep it. The two placements give different cost-per-year figures for the same money, and the one that fits is whichever matches when the money would actually leave.
Why is no winner shown?
Because the figures that decide it — what a particular one would really sell for, what it would really cost to run — are estimates only you can make. The page states both results identically and leaves the call with you. Nothing is read from anywhere, nothing is saved, and nothing here is financial advice.