Apple is letting go of its monopoly on broken screens.

IT turns out Apple might not be trying to completely kill third party iPhone repair after all.

While most of the attention of Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in San Diego was on the company’s plethora of new products and software, the biggest development didn’t even get a mention.

The product in question is Apple’s mysterious “iPhone calibration machine” that is capable of recalibrating a new Touch ID sensor to work with an existing iPhone.

Costing between $20,000 and $60,000, the mysterious machines are hidden from the public, with Apple staff claiming it is almost impossible to even photograph one.

“The calibration machine was a rather big device (imagine something roughly the size of a fairly large microwave) that phones had to be inserted into after replacing the display,” an Apple insider told Motherboard.

“It took about 10 minutes per phone to calibrate them, and the device would run a battery of pressure-sensitive tests in addition to registering the display with the secure enclave. An iPhone had to be secured in the device, naturally, and a mechanical arm would perform the necessary functions.”

Apple is tipped to remove the physical home button for the iPhone 8.Source:Supplied

Previously the machine had only been located in every flagship store, but now Apple has made it available to select third party repair companies.

So why is this big news?

Apple is tipped to move the Touch ID fingerprint-reading sensor being from the home button into the screen itself for the iPhone 8’s full-screen OLED display, which was bad news for people who are prone to breaking their screen.

And as it currently stood, the Touch ID sensor was the only part of the iPhone that had to be replaced by Apple because it is paired with the Secure Enclave — a chip providing all cryptographic operations for data protection, including Touch ID, Apple Pay and passcodes.

Given the fingerprint data is actually stored on the Secure Enclave, it would have previously been impossible to get replacement Touch ID sensors to work on your existing phone without the use of the “iPhone calibration machine” at an Apple flagship.

But with this latest move Apple is giving consumers the right to choose.

The proprietary calibration machines will first be rolled out to three “Authorised Service Providers” around the United States. News.com.au has contacted Apple for comment on when we could expect them in Australia.

Do you think Apple should make the machine available to all repairers? Continue the conversation in the comments below or with Matthew Dunn on Facebook and Twitter.