The Polishing Cloth is a small piece of off-whitemicrofiber cloth sold by Apple Inc. since October 2021 as a screen cleaning aid for its laptops and mobile devices.[1] It is also intended as a replacement for the cloth that comes with Apple's monitors such as the Pro Display XDR, and is designed for cleaning the 'nano-texture glass' version of the monitor with.[2]
The cloth gained media attention due to its high $19 retail price.[1]The New York Times described this pricing as "bold even by Apple’s standards, a company whose legions of loyal customers are conditioned to stomach steep prices."[1] Nonetheless, it was Apple's most back-ordered item in October 2021, with delivery times of several months.[1] The expensive cloth and its popularity were soon the subject of numerous jokes in the media and on social media,[1] which in turn provided grounds for criticism of the media for providing Apple's extravagances with free advertising.[3]
The tech website iFixit 'disassembled' the cloth as part of a tongue-in-cheek product teardown, describing it as being composed of two layers and having "a distinct synthetic leather feel (...) with a hint of fuzziness, similar to Alcantara."[4] The cloth also has the Apple logo embossed in the bottom right corner.[4]
