The short version
- Typical range: £80 – £600 — see the full iPhone value guide
- What decides your price: condition, and how well you evidence it in photographs
- Cost to sell here: nothing, at any price
- Category: Electronics
Before you photograph it
Ten minutes here is worth more than anything else you will do. Buyers are deciding between your listing and someone else’s, and preparation is what visibly separates the two.
- Read Settings → Battery → Battery Health and note the maximum capacity percentage. Buyers will ask, and a listing that states it up front outsells one that does not.
- Sign out of iCloud and erase all content and settings, then confirm Activation Lock is off. A locked iPhone is worth almost nothing and cannot be used by anyone else.
- Find the model and storage in Settings → General → About, and check whether the carrier line says Unlocked.
The photographs that sell an iPhone
Four photographs do almost all the work. Shoot in daylight, near a window, with the item against something plain — and do not use the flash, which flattens texture and hides exactly what buyers are trying to see.
- Front, screen on and showing the home screen, so the display is provably working
- Back and both sides, angled to catch the light and reveal any scratches or dents
- The Battery Health screen with the percentage visible
- Every crack, chip or deep scratch, photographed close and lit
Photograph the flaws too. It feels counterproductive, but a listing that shows the worst of an item gets fewer questions, fewer withdrawn offers and fewer arguments at handover. Buyers who can see the damage stop imagining something worse.
Writing the title and description
Model, storage and unlock status are the whole search: “iPhone 13 128GB Unlocked, Battery 89%”. Put the battery percentage in the title if it is above about 85% — it is the strongest single signal you can give, and most sellers bury it. Never write just “iPhone for sale”; buyers filter by model and yours will not appear.
Then state these in the description, because a buyer who has to ask is a buyer who might not bother:
- Exact model and generation, and the storage capacity in GB
- Battery maximum capacity percentage from the Settings screen
- Whether it is network unlocked, and which carrier it came from if not
- Whether the screen or battery has been replaced, and whether with genuine parts
What buyers will actually ask
You will receive the same three messages about an iPhone. Answering them in the listing itself removes the back-and-forth, and answering them well when they do arrive is what turns an enquiry into a sale.
Give the exact percentage and photograph the screen. Anything above 85% is a selling point; below 80% expect to discount, and say so before they ask.
Erase the phone and confirm Activation Lock is off before you list. Show the setup screen in a photo if you can — it proves the point instantly.
Answer honestly. A third-party screen is not a dealbreaker if disclosed and priced for, but a buyer who discovers it later has a genuine grievance.
Pricing it so it actually sells
Start from the honest condition grade rather than the price you hope for. WishThrift listings use five grades — New with Tags, Like New, Good, Fair and For Parts — and what each grade means is worth reading before you choose, because grading up is the most expensive mistake sellers make. It does not raise the price; it produces a buyer who arrives expecting something else.
The iPhone value guide prices all five grades for this item. Pick your grade, take the figure, and if you sit between two grades price toward the lower one. Items priced honestly sell faster than items priced hopefully, and on a free platform there is no fee eating the difference anyway.
What you keep, compared
On a £340 sale — roughly the middle of the range for an iPhone — here is what the commission-charging platforms would take, and what you would keep on each:
| Where you sell it | Fee | You keep |
|---|---|---|
| WishThrift | £0 | £340 |
| Poshmark | −£68 | £272 |
| eBay | −£46 | £294 |
| Mercari | −£34 | £306 |
| Etsy | −£22 | £318 |
Seller-side rates verified 26 Jul 2026 — Poshmark: 20% commission on sales of $15 and above; eBay: 13.6% final value fee, plus a per-order fee; Mercari: flat 10% selling fee; Etsy: 6.5% transaction fee, plus a listing fee and payment processing. Percentages are applied to the sterling figure above; the fixed per-order and processing charges those platforms add are quoted in their own currency and are not included here, so the real deductions are slightly larger. Full breakdown: marketplace selling fees compared.
Timing and getting it to the buyer
iPhones sell within days when priced correctly, and values step down noticeably each September when new models are announced. If you are selling anyway, selling before the announcement is worth real money.
Small and valuable, which makes it the classic target for payment scams. Confirm payment has cleared into your own account before the phone leaves your hands, meet in a public place, and never post ahead of payment.
WishThrift does not process payments or arrange delivery — you and the buyer agree both directly — so confirm payment has cleared before the item leaves your hands, and keep the conversation on the site so there is a record of what was agreed.
Ready to list it? It takes about two minutes, costs nothing, and there is no commission when it sells — create a free account or see how selling works.
Frequently asked questions
How much is a used iPhone worth?
Typically £80 to £600 depending on model, storage and battery health. Newer models with high battery capacity sit at the top. The iPhone value guide breaks it down by condition.
Do I need to unlock my iPhone before selling it?
You must sign out of iCloud and turn off Activation Lock, or the phone is unusable to the buyer and effectively worthless. Network unlocking is separate — an unlocked handset sells for more, but a carrier-locked one still sells if you say which carrier.
Where can I sell an iPhone without fees?
On WishThrift, listing and selling cost nothing, so a £300 iPhone puts £300 in your pocket rather than £259 after a 13.6% marketplace commission.
See also: what a used iPhone is worth · browse live electronics listings · condition grades explained.