One of the fastest healing screen protectors that we’ve seen. For smalls scratches that is…
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Today we’re going to review Tech 21’s self-healing impact shield. This is a plastic screen protector for the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus and based on our experience with screen protectors, this one is probably one of the easier ones to install.
With this Tech 21 screen protector, we were pleasantly surprised at how quickly the screen protector healed itself from minor scratches. We did have a couple of issues with the build and fit of the screen protector but it generally gets the job done.
Based on our time with the screen protector, we gave it a score of 4.2 Eh’s out of 5. When compared to other self-healing screen protectors, the Tech 21 Impact Shield, Self Heal scores higher than InvisibleShields HDX by a little bit. If you’d rather read the rest of this review, head over to our website and if your trying to figure out which iPhone screen protector to get, check out our comparison tool. We go through lots of different screen protectors to see which one is BEST!
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Design – Sweet installation tool but it doesn’t work 100%
In terms of design, this is a fairly thin screen protector that covers most of your iPhone’s touchscreen which seems silly to us. Even if you’re slightly off with your installation, you’re still going to expose parts of your touchscreen. What seems even sillier is that Tech 21 includes an installation tool to help with the installation.
With that being said, the installation tool is better than trying to thumb the installation of the self-healing screen protector. Removing/reapplying the screen protector isn’t too bad but be careful how much you bend the screen protector as the corner that we used to peel back didn’t sit flush on the screen any more.
Dust removal isn’t too bad but Tech 21 doesn’t include any dust removal tools. You might be able to get away with using a removable sticker or some painters tape.
The last thing we will talk about in terms of design is the inclusion of BulletShield, which is a BASF polymer found in bullet proof glass that absorbs and dissipates impact. These polymers make the Impact Shield seem really tough but as you’ll reading the next section, it’s not invincible.
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Protection – Bulletproof polymers did nothing against Bertha (our steel ball)
In terms of scratch protection, the Tech 21 impact shield will heal up from minor scratches. Deeper scratches or gouges will be permanent as we’ve discovered from our Santouku test and metal file test. One of the neat things that we noticed was how quickly the this screen protector healed up when compared to the HDX. Tech 21 uses the term “Anti-scratch” on their product description…I’m not so sure about that.
In terms of impact protection, the Tech 21 Impact shield will protect your iPhone from breaking in general. At 22 inches, it was fine. at 24 inches it was fine, at 30 inches it was fine. At 36 inches, it failed. Now some of you might be thinking, why didn’t you do smaller increments with the drops? Well, we were caught up in the moment and in a moment of weakness, we thought that the BASF bulletproof polymers were going to be pretty incredible. They were not.
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Functionality – “Perfect optical clarity” Uh-huh…
For the functionality of the screen protector, we did notice a bit of glare but it was bearable but the one thing that bothered us was the “perfect optical clarity” of the screen protector as we did notice a slight diffusion of the iPhone’s touchscreen.
For the sensitivity of the iPhone’s touchscreen, we didn’t notice any changed though the screen protector does have more of a “plastic” feel as your fingers don’t slide as easily across the screen.
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Have questions about our Tech 21 Impact Shield Self Healing Screen Protector Review for the iPhone 6/6 Plus? Please ask them on our Google+ page or on our Facebook page.
Calvin
January 14, 2021 at 4:49 pm
Hi Aaron,
You may want to let people know the next time you review a Tech21 screen protector that they have changed their warranty. https://www.tech21.com/pages/warranty. Please note the line:
“• any screen protection product after it is removed from packaging;”
I was pointed to this recently as my month old screen protector ripped in the area of the Wifi/4g/battery indicator on the screen (Samsung) that I never touch. They refused to replace it. My gripe is how can they state they will cover “Material and workmanship” and then turn around and say once it comes out of the package, we are on our own. They could send us a box of rocks and we’d have no recourse.
Too many other companies out their for me to put up with that.
Just sounding the horn because I’d hate for someone to pay the prices they are asking and get stuck like I did.