What is “Apple Black Box Refurbished”? The “Black Box” website deals in other telecom products. Apple Certified phones have one year warranties, not 90 day Woot, and new batteries. 95% battery sounds great but cycle count relative to 500 might indicate much less realistically. The “90%” phones I have purchased recently have come with cycle counts of 400 which is closer to the 80% end of life than the Apple algorithm on battery health implies
What warrenlms said.
@ThunderThighs what say you?
Per the vendor, these phones are the grade just below the stuff that Apple keeps for themselves and sells as Certified Pre-owned with a 1 Year Apple Warranty. That’s why these come with a Woot warranty, not a warranty from Apple. With respect to the battery health, all the information we have is in the yellow box.
“Apple Black Box Refurbished” is what we’re naming this grade of product on Woot for the moment to distinguish it from our other refurbished phone deals and to try and convey the higher quality of product we hope it represents (see images below). Do let us know your feedback if you end up buying one.
Do they, being APPLE, allow you to put these under an Apple Care policy?
99% sure the answer is “no, they don’t”.
Kinda figured, but thank you so much for the quick response!
Thanks for the photos. This looks like the same model (13 Pro) and color (graphite, or maybe silver?) I ordered a few hours ago. Nice to get a little preview. If this phone arrives in the same condition as the Apple Watch 8 I bought from Woot! last month I’m going to be a very happy guy. That was also described as being in like-new pristine condition and that assessment was totally accurate. Great deal.
Oh, and it’s interesting to note that the newest refurbished iPhone that Apple sells on their website is the iPhone 12 (in its many versions). They still sell a plain ol’ iPhone 13 new, but that’s all for the 13.
I use iphones and the iphone 14 is the worst iphone I’ve used yet. Wish I had my 8 plus still. This will probably be my last iphone.
Oops, I was wrong. Apple has seven different refurbished iPhone 13 Pros on sale right now. I swear there were none yesterday!
I still have my 8, not to tease or make you feel bad. Until it is dead, I will continue to hold onto it as alli do with it is to avoid phone calls!!! I am looking at a 14 for my husband…maybe not now? You two could trade! 
You are not losing it … there were none yesterday! The 512GB iphone 13 Pro in the apple refurb store is $929, making this Woot! deal pretty sweet.
In for two!
That’s my thinking. There’s no question that the Apple refurbs are super nice, but the $300+ savings with this deal made it irresistible to me, especially after getting my absolutely perfect Apple Watch from Woot! last month. Woot! has been selling a lot of nice Apple stuff recently, much of it brand new.
So, is it true that these phones were not, in fact, Apple refurbished??!
There is a new “black box refurbished” iphone 13 Pro listing that looks to be for the exact same thing (here) except the yellow box description has changed from “refurbished by Apple” to “expertly refurbished”.
Interesting also that this forum thread is now disassociated from the original product listing (here). Wonder why that is?
Bottom line, “refurbished by Apple” and “expertly refurbished by a third party” are nowhere near the same thing. @ThunderThighs Woot! should give everyone who bought these a 1 year warranty!
There’s no conspiracy going on here.
Yes, Apple refurbished. Most manufacturers do not do the work themselves. They farm it out to 3rd parties to do the work to their specifications. No different here but these didn’t pass the bar for sale in the Apple store. They’re just a smidgen below that. See the post above.
The forum thread is not linking to the other sale because, like many things, our system sucks in handling URLs. The other sale ended on 2/21. This sale was created with the same title so our system added a “-1” to the URL. Unfortunately, our system ignores that added bit and just goes to the most recent sale. Drives me batty but not much I can do about it. It’s on a long list of things to be fixed.
Looking in our admin, the sales refer to the correct threads but aren’t linking that way.
Original thread: 1609757 (You can see this number in the url)
Warehouse Cleanout (this): 1626489 or here
The thread was created but linking went wonky.
And sorry, but we decide the warranty length, not you.
Well, yes, of course you do. My suggestion was related to * if * the phones were not, in fact, refurbished by Apple. The most recent offer of these blackbox phones suggests there might be some question about Apple’s involvement since the Apple reference has been removed from those listings.
I bought one during this deal. It came with 100% battery and had not a single blemish. It worked flawlessly. I’m looking for this deal again for my grandson. Dang— why can’t there be one today?!