Premium, Excellent, Very Good or Good: Where the Difference Lies

Four words the trade invented for itself

Premium, Excellent, Very good and Good appear in no piece of legislation. It is a scale the refurbished trade came up with itself to solve one practical problem: how do you explain in a webshop how much use can be seen on a device, without the buyer having to interpret twenty photographs. You will meet that scale in one form or another at almost every shop, sometimes with these four words, sometimes with letters or with stars.

It is worth knowing what those words mean elsewhere, because as soon as you compare prices between shops, in practice you are comparing grades. The same model with the same storage can differ by tens of euros, and that difference nearly always sits here rather than in the technical side. We do not use that scale, and we explain why further down.

Nowhere is the boundary actually fixed

Because nobody owns the scale, every shop decides for itself where Excellent stops and Very good begins. The same phone can sit in the second level with one seller and in the third with another. That is not deception, it is simply what happens to a word that has no definition.

So always ask how the looking was done and, above all, at what distance. A device you look at from thirty centimetres, in ordinary light, is a very different thing from the same device under a bright lamp in raking light. Without that distance a level means little, and with a letter or a number of stars instead, even less.

What the four words mean elsewhere

Premium

The top level: no visible signs of use, an unblemished screen, an unblemished housing and unblemished edges. This is the grade shops offer to anyone who wants to use the device without a case. It is also the level most often sold out, because a device still in that state after two years of use is the exception. You are paying a premium that has more to do with scarcity than with the technical side.

Excellent

There has been use, but you have to look for it to see it: a very slight worn patch on an edge or a corner, something you notice when you tilt the device in the light and then forget about again. The screen is supposed to be clean at viewing distance. In most webshops this is the level sold as “as good as new”, and it is usually the best-selling option.

Very good

Light marks you can genuinely see at normal viewing distance if you look for them: a fine scratch, an edge that no longer shines like the rest. Nothing that disturbs the picture and nothing you can feel under your finger. At shops that offer this level it is usually the sensible buy, precisely because the gap with the level above it disappears under a case.

Good

Visibly used: scratches you notice straight away, often on the housing, sometimes light marks on the glass, possibly a small knock on a corner. The device is supposed to work fully; it simply carries its history openly. This is the cheapest level, and at most shops also the one that leads to the most argument afterwards, because “visibly used” is precisely the phrase with no sharp boundary.

Why that choice does not exist with us

• Every device is given a new screen in our workshop in Zarren. The glass you look at all day is therefore not the previous owner’s.
• Every device is given a new housing as well. The scratches, the worn patches and the knocks on the edges go out with the old frame.
• Every device also goes through thirty-two checkpoints, and the battery is at at least eighty-five per cent or it is replaced.
• On top of that come twenty-four months of warranty on the device and the battery, thirty days to change your mind with free returns, and free shipping within Belgium and the Netherlands.

So with us there is one version, and it is as new. You do not choose a grade, you do not pay a premium for an unblemished example and you do not get a discount for scratches, because there are none.

What that changes in practice

Most of the change is in the buying itself. There are no photographs to compare, no description to weigh up, and no guessing whether what one shop calls Very good is the same as what another calls Excellent. All you compare is model, storage and price, and those are the three things you still notice a year later. An argument about a small scratch that was not quite mentioned cannot arise with us, because the housing it would be on is new.

One point does still apply to every used device, ours included: on a device that has been opened at some point, water and dust resistance is no longer a guarantee. The original seal is factory work that you do not get back one for one, not even with new parts. So keep your device out of the rain and out of the swimming pool, regardless of what the model’s specification says.

What you do still choose

The generation. This is where the money genuinely sits, and at the same time the choice that decides how much longer your device will receive software updates. A model a generation or two younger costs more and lasts longer; two generations older is cheaper and has a shorter horizon. That is a trade-off measured in years, not in scratches.

The storage. It is fixed to the board and cannot be added later, so this is the one choice you genuinely cannot put right. Anyone torn between two sizes is better off with the larger: too little storage irritates you daily, and whatever you save on it is swallowed up within six months.

And the version: standard or Pro, and with a tablet the entry-level model, the Air or the Pro. That is about lenses, screen and processing power, and therefore about what you do with the device. For most people the generation weighs more heavily than the version, and the storage more heavily than both.

If you are unsure

There is no description you have to trust and no photograph you have to interpret, but you can still simply take the device into your own hand: you have thirty days to change your mind with free returns, and shipping to Belgium and the Netherlands is free. How we rebuild a device and what we test it on is written out under quality; which models and storage sizes are in stock at the moment can be seen with the iPhones.