Bought a refurbished flagship phone from a couple of years back instead of a brand new budget model, mostly because the price difference meant I could get noticeably better cameras and overall performance for roughly the same money, though I was genuinely nervous going into it since I had never bought anything refurbished before and had heard mixed things from different people about how reliable it actually is.
The seller offered a six month warranty along with the phone, which helped ease some of the initial hesitation, and the listing mentioned it came with a battery health rating along with photos showing the actual physical condition rather than just generic stock images, which felt like a reasonable amount of transparency compared to some other refurbished listings I had briefly looked at before deciding on this specific one.
Phone arrived about a week after ordering, physical condition matched what was described reasonably closely, a couple of very minor scuff marks on the back that were mentioned upfront, screen itself looks completely fine with no visible damage. Battery health showed around eighty five percent capacity when I checked it, which is noticeably lower than a new phone would be but has still been lasting me a full day of fairly normal use so far without any alarming drop off.
It has been about three weeks now and everything has worked fine, no unexpected issues, performance feels genuinely good for daily use including some lighter gaming occasionally, though I am aware three weeks is not exactly a long enough test period to fully judge long term reliability just yet.
Has anyone here bought refurbished phones regularly and had a mostly positive experience over a longer stretch of actual use, or does something eventually tend to go wrong once you get past the initial few months? Curious whether my current good experience is likely to hold up over the next year or if I should brace for something eventually.