Editor’s note: Repairability will be a topic of discussion at the 2026 E-Scrap: The Longevity Conference Oct. 26-28 in New Orleans. For more on this topic also look for the upcoming print edition of E-Scrap News, out in October.
Google has long supported the right-to-repair movement, and more recently the company has been taking steps to design repairability into its products, a company executive told E-Scrap News.
Steven Nickel, director of consumer hardware operations for Google, said that repairing broken devices is “just good all around.” It benefits the environment and consumers, he said, as well as the business, because it “keeps devices in customers’ hands and ensures that they’re out and being used as opposed to sitting in somebody’s drawer somewhere.”
Nickel has been testifying to various legislatures and advocating on behalf of right-to-repair bills around the US and abroad.
“The idea of promoting repair through legislation is just a win all around,” said Nickel. “So we’re really supportive.”
Right-to-repair laws generally guarantee three things: access to parts, tools and manuals to fix covered products, which can range from cars to cellphones, from medical devices to appliances.
Providing access to those three elements “was a fundamental value for how we set up repair for our products,” said Nickel, starting around 2010, when Google entered the consumer hardware business with its Nexus One smartphone.
From the beginning, Google worked with third parties to facilitate repair of its products, from walk-in centers to repair depots, all around the globe. This includes key partner uBreakiFix.
“When you’re working with third parties, you have to make this information available,” said Nickel. At the same time, the tech giant saw the right-to-repair movement take root. “We thought this aligns so closely with our values of how we run repair that it felt like something that we could lend our voice to, and as a way to really drive the overall industry to say this is good for everybody.”
Google is also a partner with iFixit, a company and community of users that has helped thousands of people fix their devices over the past two decades. “We work really closely with iFixit to ensure parts are available for DIYers,” said Nickel.
Kyle Wiens, the CEO and co-founder of iFixit, told E-Scrap News that Google “has been fantastic to work with. “Google has parts available for a reasonable price, great repair information and free repair tools,” said Wiens. “They’re leading the industry on this.”
Nickel said what he is most excited about is moving repairability up the product lifecycle. “What we’ve really done over time is start to think more and more about repairability at a product design conception phase, which is really how early you have to get,” said Nickel.
The key, he said, is to closely partner with product teams to design repairability into the product from the get-go. The good news, he added, is that product teams “get it” and “want to focus on repairability,” although they also have other priorities to juggle, from safety to performance. Nickel supports them by providing information on repairs from the real world and doing product teardowns.
A concrete example is the latest Pixel Watch, which was designed to eliminate glues — which Nickel calls “the enemy of repair” — and open easily. It was designed to have the battery and display relatively easy to swap out, as those are the most likely components to fail.
Wiens said, “The redesign of the new Pixel Watch is notable. It’s the first major smartwatch that’s readily serviceable. That’s a big deal.”
Next steps could include color coding screws, for easier disassembly, and making other tweaks to component layouts to give visual cues to repair, said Nickel
Wiens added that smartphone design for repairability continues to be a challenge for all manufacturers, including Google. “These devices are thin, and OLED displays are fragile,” he said. “We’d love to see them reduce adhesive usage and find other ways of attaching the battery to make removal easier.”
Nickel added that repairability scorecards, which measure how repairable a given product is, are helpful in speaking with designers. He said the scorecards could eventually be standardized across the country or world.
“It’s really great to see how repairability has evolved for us,” said Nickel. “We’ve always been supportive, but now it’s ingrained in the culture, where you hear the language back from product teams and designers, and externally. We’re talking more about repairability.”
