I have been a Best Buy Total subscriber for going on 4 years or more. The main benefit to me is the inclusion of 2-years of AppleCare on every product you buy from them. If you pair it with Best Buy’s price matching, you can always get the best price on Apple products and you’re saving an extra $200+ if you factor in 2 years of AppleCare that’s included for free. At $179 per year, you really need to buy 1-2 Apple products a year and the rest of the Total benefits are free (like extended return periods, free shipping, repairs savings and more).
Today Apple announced AppleCare One (link):
For just $19.99 per month, customers can protect up to three products in one plan, with the option to add more at any time for $5.99 per month for each device
$240 a year (give or take a few pennies) gets you coverage for 3 products and $5.99 a month to add an additional device. Apple’s plan works with all of their devices for which AppleCare can be attached and that can lead to some great savings for people purchasing Pro devices. Here are some of Apple’s monthly AppleCare+ prices:
- iPhone 16 Pro / Pro Max (2025) – AppleCare+ standard: $13.99/mo
- iPhone 16 / 15 (2024/2025) – AppleCare+ standard: $11.99/mo
- iPad Pro (M4, 2024) – AppleCare+: $7.49/mo (annual $79/yr)
- MacBook Air 16″ – AppleCare+: $14.99/mo (annual $149.99/yr)
- MacBook Air – AppleCare+: 7.99/mo (annual $79/yr)
- Apple Watch (S10), $3.99/mo
- AirPods Pro, $14.99/yr
Anyone who just has an iPhone, Watch and AirPods probably shouldn’t go with AppleCare One but if you are also toting around a MacBook Air, you are going to save some money at $19.99 a month.
The main advantage to AppleCare Monthly is that is never expires until you cancel it and maybe there’s some legalese related to that but my M1 MacBook Pro 16″ was $149.99 a year to add a 4th year to my 3-year plan that was expiring in December. I’ll be able to renew again this December having paid about $598 over 5-years to protect my computer against accidental damage or parts failures. Cheap insurance considering I paid over $3,000 for the machine new. A $900 MacBook Air at $79 a year would be $395 to cover for 5 years and I find that less compelling, worse so if you are paying $7.99 a month or $287 over 3 years to cover your $900 MacBook Air
With AppleCare purchased individually, the most you’ll pay for 3 devices (assuming iPad, iPhone and MacBook Pro) is $36 a month or $432 a year so $240 to cover all 3 IS a deal and you continue to have coverage until you cancel AppleCare One or decide to unenroll one of your products and enroll another. The “covers 3 and then $5.99 for each additional device” does require avid Apple device owners to really consider the economics. Unenrolling a MacStudio to cover your new AirPods is a bad idea but Apple isn’t going to break down that math for you. You pick what you want to cover.
In my household, we have 2 iPads Pro, 1 iPad mini, 2 iPhone Pro Max, 2 AirPods Pro, 2 Beats Studio, 2 M1 MacBook Pros, 2 AppleTV 4Ks, 3 HomePods, 1 HomePod mini and 1 AirPods Pro Max.
We’re an edge-case household but if I were to take Apple up on this coverage, I’d be paying for 18 devices or $19.99 for 3 of them plus $89.95 a month or $1,319 a year to cover every device until Apple classifies the device as vintage or we replace it. Considering MSRP if all of those were bought new due to a household flood (ignoring that we have home insurance) would be well into the $15,000 price, it’s still not terrible but in no way should a reasonable family take Apple up on this “deal”.
Which is why I’ll return and advocate for households like ours to just do BestBuy Total for $179 a year! Every one of those devices I listed above had 2 years of coverage paid for by BestBuy for the first 2 years and, via Best Buy’s account management area, I can attach monthly coverage to any device that is about to hit the end of the 2-years-free mark. I did that for my Apple Watch Ultra and iPad Pro M1 for a month or two until those devices were replaced. We’re on 2 year upgrades for iPhone, Apple Watch and AirPods so those don’t need anything beyond 2 years and we’re on 3-4 years for MacBooks which is why I switched to a $149 a year plan directly with Apple to continue coverage until those devices are replaced.
AppleCare One is a nice deal for someone who is attaching monthly AppleCare Plans to 3-4 devices a year and keeping those averages for peace of mind. I also would like to say that Apple is rewriting history a bit by pretending that annual, 2-year and 3-year plans never existed because those were a good deal comparatively. Today, it’s $399 to cover a MacBook Pro 16″ M4 Max for 3-years, $149 for 1 year and $14.99 a month or $540 to cover for 3 years if you’re paying monthly. The 3-year plan is only $11 a month but Apple isn’t going to tell you that. They’re going to show you $14.99 for MacBook Pro and $13.99 for iPhone and pretend like they’re doing you a favor. You can still attach AppleCare 2 and 3 year plans to a device you bought by calling Apple’s hotline or chatting with them. They just don’t show you those plans or mention them to you in retail stores.
It’s great AppleCare One exists, I think it should truly be ONE plan for an entire household. Charge me $25 a month and let me have coverage on every single device until it hits vintage status but this is Apple. Their 3-device plan covers MOST of their customers, adds $240 in services revenue annually they may not have realized in the past, boosts Apple Store attach rates at time of sale for a new iPhone “for $6 more than AppleCare for iPhone, you can cover your AirPods and watch!” and makes shareholders happy.
I implore you all to consider Best Buy Total if you must have AppleCare and if you have over 3 devices. Besides, you’ll pay less for your Apple Devices at Best Buy anyway since seemingly retail price controls (MAP rules) Apple used to be stringent on no longer apply to retailers where you can buy a $249 AirPods Pro 2 for $149 most days of the week and with Best Buy Total, you get 2 years of AppleCare+ for “free”.
I got super excited to see an AppleCare One option because I’ve been asking for it for years as a part of a larger $100-$200 a month subscription where I rented every Apple Device from them including AppleCare and be able to trade in iPad, iPhone, MacBook Pro every 12 months but they haven’t done that yet and AppleCare One shows me it’ll be significantly more expensive than I was hoping but we’ll see.
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