What even is the point of the AppleCare warranty, or is it only through providers?

Apple Care+ extends warranty coverage up to 2 years (3 in some places), for manufacturing defects and offers unlimited instances of accidental damage coverage for a reduced fee. Apple Care+ does not offer free replacements of damaged devices at all.

click here ➜ https://www.apple.com/legal/sales-support/applecare/applecareplus/2610/261028_applecareplus_us.pdf

If you can prove they were damaged before you opened the box, Apple may be able to replace them, without invoking the Apple Care+ coverage, otherwise, without sufficient proof of damage in transit or during shipping, they would require you to pay the reduced fee for an incident of accidental damage on the devices.

With that said, you do need to deal directly with Apple Support for this. This is a user to user forum, and you are not addressing Apple or Apple Support here, so we users can't really do anything in regards to Apple Care coverage here.

CrispyNcakey wrote:

i bought a brand new iphone 17 pro max and apple watch 11 and not only did they come both broken in box i have proof from returns, and i have people who can vouch for me but i also had to use my AppleCare warranty how is that fair for me to be spending a grand on a new phone to have a scratched camera lens and dented phone back and a watch that has 4 broken sensors????? and i didnt even break it.?

Who did you purchase the devices from? If not from Apple directly, you use the return/warranty policy of the seller.

Hello~ If I received a broken item …then my first corse of action is to the seller and then to carrier. I always unbox items of importance on camera for an additional layer of evidence.

Also …who did you purchase these from?

~Katana-San~