In 2022, Apple agreed to pay a $50 million settlement to eligible 2015-2019 MacBook owners who had to deal with faulty butterfly keyboards. In December 2022, emails about the class action lawsuit were sent out to the eligible MacBook owners. And, in June 2024, the court issued a payment order, where Apple had to settle the payments by August 2024. To abide by the law, Apple has started sending settlement funds to customers affected by Apple’s faulty MacBook butterfly keyboard design.
The Butterfly keyboard debuted in 2015 with the new 12-inch MacBook, and it was later expanded to the MacBook Pro in 2016 and MacBook Air in 2018. The keyboard design proved problematic for the customers and several users raised reliability and durability concerns. Although Apple updated the design several times during this period, the butterfly mechanism turned out to be a failure. Thousands of customers reported issues such as sticky keys, duplicate keys, and complete keyboard failures, often due to dust, crumbs, and other debris.
By late 2019, Apple finally moved from the faulty Butterfly keyboard design and switched to the “scissors-switch” design. In mid-2020, Apple adopted the new Magic Keyboard more durable to withstand everyday wear and tear.
To address the Butterfly keyboard issues, Apple launched a Repair Program in June 2018, covering MacBook, MacBook Air, and MacBook Pro models launched between early 2015 and 2019. However, it only replaced butterfly keyboards with other butterfly keyboards, which wasn’t a permanent fix to the problem.
In May 2018, a class action lawsuit was filed against Apple on the grounds that the butterfly keyboard design was inoperable and unsuitable for use. In 2022, Apple agreed to settle the class action lawsuit, but it completely denied the lawsuit’s claims.
Now, in 2024, customers have started receiving payouts. According to the settlement website, MacBook owners who had 2 or more top-case replacements from Apple within four years of purchase will get between $300 to $395. If the customer has got only one replacement, they could receive up to $125. Whereas, owners who had only keycap replacements will get a maximum of $50.
It’s worth knowing that only Apple customers in California, New Jersey, Illinois, Michigan, Washington, Florida, and New York who needed replacements or repairs were eligible for payouts.
