Suffered Apple's butterfly keyboard MacBook? You might be owed compensation (if you act fast)

2017 MacBook Pro
(Image credit: iMore)

Apple's butterfly keyboard was a terrible time for the company, failing left and right across the MacBook, MacBook Air, and MacBook Pro lineups. If you had one fail yourself, you might be due part of a $50 million settlement.

That settlement covers people in the United States who bought a MacBook, MacBook Air, or MacBook Pro between 2015 and 2019 and had to replace their keyboards or keycaps due to Apple's design flaw. Three groups of people can claim their share, but time's running out — the March 6 deadline looms large.

The replacements

The Verge reports that people who had to replace their keyboard more than once should be good for up to $395 in compensation, while anyone who replaced the keyboard once or had to swap out individual keycaps to no avail can also claim. So if that's you, you can get up to $125 for that keyboard replacement or up to $50 for replaced keycaps.

Alongside that March 6 date, there's another catch to note — you need to have had the work carried out by Apple or one of its authorized service providers and have had it done within four years of purchase to be included in the class action lawsuit.

It's also worth noting that these figures are just a guide and will go down if more people make a claim than is expected. Still, any amount of free money is a good thing.

This came about after Apple repeatedly released Macs with the ill-fated butterfly keyboard installed. It's claimed the company knew that the keyboard wasn't up to scratch, with many people having to replace it multiple times because each new one eventually failed. Issues included keys refusing to work or becoming stuck at the slightest sign of dust or debris.

Apple eventually did away with the butterfly keyboard, instantly making the new machines the best MacBooks money could buy.

Oliver Haslam
Contributor

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too.

Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.