Blah. I travel internationally quite a bit and a physical SIM is a must-have. eSim carrier support is getting better, but it's by no means 100% globally yet. Currently running dual eSim and a SIM from different carriers. I crossed a border for a few hours this weekend and the secondary SIM picked up without a hitch.
dual eSIM[0] has been available from apple already, but more than that is in question, though they did use the term "multiple eSIMs" in the presentation. i'm bummed about the removal of the sim tray too.
I was thinking more about how eSIM really limits you and adds carrier control. For example, my partner has a cell plan that allows you a big bucket of data, then lets you link multiple SIMs to that data. The idea is it's for your tablets, watches, etc. But I use a secondary SIM from his plan on my phone to add to my data for free. But there's no way to install an eSIM for this plan on a secondary device as it wasn't an "intended use" to use multiple phones. With a physical SIM, I can use this data on any device I choose.
eSIM is a very nice convenient feature, but not at the expense of a physical SIM.
yah, the move to eSIM is about consolidating control for apple and the carriers at the expense of the consumer. it's also an anti-privacy move (you can buy SIMs anonymously with cash, but not eSIMs), but of course, apple didn't announce that little nugget of information.
Can QR codes for eSIMs be sold like traditional SIMs? I haven't actually gone through the eSIM registration process, but I assumed this should be possible.
doubt they'd support that. it's surely technically possible, but apple & the carriers like to gatekeep the eSIM provisioning process to make you reveal your identity.
It is possible to buy an anonymous eSIM, the only provider I have come across won’t allow outbound SMS or calls though. Inbound SMS and calls as well as data are fully functioning. (Therefore can be used for messaging services that require a verified phone number).
I know that’s not exactly what everyone would want, but for some use cases that may suffice.
In my experience, eSIM is only good when things go as expected. If things get messed up on the carrier end, you'll have to go to the cellphone store to get it fixed. Every. Time. They cannot ship you a replacement sim card.
Losing the ability to easily swap physical SIM cards seems like a major loss in functionality and robustness for consumers. All for a minor convenience during first setup. Am I missing something?
The ability to move SIM cards around isn't something the carrier likes. eSIMs give them that control back.
The ability for you to easily pick up a local SIM while travelling isn't something either the local carrier wants (they'd rather be paid 10x as much in roaming fees) nor your primary carrier wants (they'd rather have you roaming which means they can now tack on a bigger margin on the roaming fees).
eSIM involves the carrier during the provisioning step (the QR code you get is one-time-use) and I don't believe you can move them, which means to move the eSIM the carrier needs to be involved again to give you a new QR code. This could involve fees or other unreasonable requirements.
Good point. Careers don't want to have another SIM slot because they don't want cross-shopping, so naturally they had also against to eSIM. Now eSIM is available anyway so it looks smart to move to eSIM only to avoid cross-shopping for physical SIM only operator.
Clearly Apple is going to save billions of dollars because they don't have to include those little metal sim tray openers in the box anymore.
Jokes aside, I doubt people swap sims very often and when they do it is because they are doing a first setup. International travel is obviously an instance where people do swap sims but I expect it will become easier to use esim for this now that you have to.
I welcome the move to esim-only and have been using it since the Pixel 2. Having to stick a little 256KB card into the side of my state of the art, thousand dollar phone just so it can connect to a cellular network and having to get a new card if I want to swap networks is ridiculous.
I think it is a huge inconvenience. When I was with my stepdad, trying to port a SIM to an eSIM took over 20 minutes. Since my mom wasn't there, we attempted to call her because they needed at least the last four of her SSN and the account password (which she couldn't remember).
In the end, we found out that we could simply just pop out the old SIM and put it in the new phone. That took us all of 30 seconds.
1. You can have any number of eSims on your device and have two active simultaneously, such as one for a data and one for a calling. You can optimise your costs based on who is providing the better deal.
2. You can 'manually' switch out eSims or set up location based shortcuts to put in the correct eSim for you (the automation is useful for people who regularly cross a border.)
3. eSims can be loaded directly from an app, this is how the majority of eSims function - QR codes are just another means of loading an eSim without an app or when using a provider that doesn't support loading eSims without an active data plan.
4. Global eSim data plan providers are competitive. An example is TruPhone which I found cheaper than local alternatives. Local providers cash in on holidaymakers.
5. Purchasing a local calling plan requires ID such as a passport (regardless for eSim or physical sim cards), if just needing data however: global eSim-based data providers don't have this burden.
6. Switching physical sims can wear them down to become faulty (such as by touching their contacts them too much) - eSim can be sent digitally or scanned from a physical card. It's much faster to get a phone back on a network with eSims than it is physical sims.
The -real- downsides of eSims:
1. eSims are largely the domain of wealthier countries. Many African providers don't have local eSim offerings (but the global providers still function of course).
2. China is a notable hold out on eSims because data plans can be obtained without providing your ID to the government, there is a similar story with other countries that have tight filtering/control over their internet.
What happens when your phone breaks? How does one migrate an eSIM from a broken phone to a new (or other existing) phone without having to physically go to the cellphone store, or other such shenanigans?
My quick web search revealed eSIMs to be non-portable.
I was on various CDMA (and IDEN, rip Nextel) carriers for the first 15 years of this century. Bar none, my absolute favorite thing about finally switching to T-Mobile was the physical SIM.
Cell provider websites are almost universally garbage and swapping IMEIs to activate different phone hardware was a complete nightmare that bugged out far too often.
If the eSIM swapping process is at all similar, this feels like a step backwards even if you don’t travel a lot.
I used the eSIM swap feature a few months ago and it was surprisingly seamless. Once I set up my new phone, I got a prompt on my old one asking if I wanted to convert my physical SIM to eSIM, hit approve, entered PIN, and the eSIM was instantly available on my new phone.
Right now I see 1 comment (yours) that says it worked fine , and way more than lists problems and issues
eSIM seems to be good for the carrier (who doesn't have to ship anything or manage a database of SIMs for sale: provision on demand) but not for the customer.
Personally, I will not buy anything that doesn't offer an option for an actual SIM. SIM? Yes! eSIM+SIM? Sure! eSIM only? Nope.
It's like these services that ask "for your safety, please enter" (whatever, say the SSN): in general, when it says that, it's the opposite: it's for the safety of the service provider, putting the user at risk, and adding inconvenience.
Just like "The Democratic Republic of..." old joke: if it needs to say so and to add that in its name, it's likely neither a democracy nor a republic.
> eSIM seems to be good for the carrier (who doesn't have to ship anything or manage a database of SIMs for sale: provision on demand) but not for the customer.
Except that as a customer I can buy cell service from my phone without having to anywhere or have anything shipped to me. eSIM is great for me personally. I had bought cell service on my main iPad (Mini 6) and it was seamless, then a few months later I tried to do the same on an iPad 6 (test/demo device) and realized I would have to get a real sim card so I just gave up and moved on because it wasn't that important and would have just been a "nice to have". eSIM makes my life easier though I understand international travelers might have some rough spots until the carriers get onboard (which they will because... Apple).
> Just like "The Democratic Republic of..." old joke: if it needs to say so and to add that in its name, it's likely neither a democracy nor a republic.
From Lord of War:
> "Every faction in Africa calls themselves by these noble names - Liberation this, Patriotic that, Democratic Republic of something-or-other... I guess they can't own up to what they usually are: the Federation of Worse Oppressors Than the Last Bunch of Oppressors. Often, the most barbaric atrocities occur when both combatants proclaim themselves Freedom Fighters."
This prevents me (a Tello user) from getting the new phone. There are only like 3 US MVNOs that support eSIM. I wonder how long that will remain the case now that the writing is on the wall. I tried Google Fi eSIM a while back prior to traveling and even after working on the phone with Google support they had to ship me a physical SIM to bootstrap the eSIM.
Phew! I'm not sure about Rogers and Bell, but Telus doesn't seem to grasp what the "e" stands for in eSIM. You have to go to a store and buy a physical card with the eSIM QR code printed on it. Instant online-delivery? Naw, that's too hard. (I opted for an eSIM with my iPad Pro.)
I've spent time in both the UK and Mexico this year and simply picked up a local physical pre-pay SIM card. No local pre-pay eSIMs were available. Hopefully that will change in time but currently the only options appear to be expensive global eSIMs which cost 5-10x as much per gigabyte.
There's currently 15 providers of those global data eSims, and I find the one I use significantly cheaper than local providers.
The trick is not to buy "global data", but just data for the country you are visiting. For example compare TruPhone to O2.
TruPhone eSim: 16 EUR for 20GB, 30 day validity (this is the most expensive option.)
O2 Sim-only: 15 GBP for 5GB, 12 month validity. (this is the cheapest option.)
A traveller doesn't need 12 months of validity, they need data - Local providers rip off travellers by not making reasonable plans available. The biggest scam are the "1pound" plans in Tesco, which are not 1 pound plans, but just the cost to buy the sim card which then requires a costly plan.
That O2 price seems very expensive - I just walked into a Vodafone shop and got a free SIM and 20GB 30 day plan for £10.
That Truphone deal is not bad but outside of Europe the plans are much more expensive. Mexico is US$24 for 5GB whereas a local SIM works at US$10 with 6GB and unlimited Facebook/WhatsApp/Twitter.
Edit: looking at O2 it seems to be £15 for 20GB. Not sure where your figure is from.
I don't know about others, but what would have been a day one purchase for me is now going to be put off because of this one limitation. Flying into some random country, buying a prepaid SIM card at the airport or some street corner and popping it into my phone is something I do multiple times a year, but this phone seems to only have been designed with the major US carriers in mind (and not even most MVNOs). eSIM is not at all prevalent in most of the world.
In fact Apple knows this themselves, which is why international iPhone 14 models are going to keep the SIM tray. Removing it from US models is such a bizarre decision to me. Does the target iPhone user in the US just not travel?
Or maybe you land in a new country, the iPhone is like "hey I see you're in a new country, want a data package?" and you could just opt-in to something straight from your phone and be connected before you even get off the plane without needing to buy a disposable SIM card.
With that being said, I think it would be better if carriers were just global tbh. But that's a dream.
I think that makes sense b/c they’re basically “doing the sale” similar to how a retailer might advertise a product that they up sell from a wholesale price.
Idk about 30%, but yea whatever they agree to with carriers for integrating this feature into the iPhone seems to make sense to me.
I mean are you really going to be upset that one multi-billion dollar corporation is getting a share of the revenue of other multi-billion dollar corporations? Should we be upset that Amazon sells Apple products on Amazon.com?
Or do you think Apple and others should just not create features like this or make it easier for you to switch carriers in different countries when the carriers themselves are making billions ripping you off with overpriced throw-away SIM cards?
Ultimately if they're developing features like this, I don't care if they do or don't get a cut. My life gets a lot better. If (to use the US as an example) Verizon makes a little less money because they're paying Apple. Whatever. Could not care less.
Apple will probably eventually launch their own service anyway unless anti-trust breaks them up. iPhone is so huge that they can truly own the full stack if they so desire.
> I think it would be better if carriers were just global tbh.
T-Mobile is pretty close. Most monthly plans get unlimited data and text in 200+(?) countries. Pay $10 extra for better data speeds. Haven't had to buy an airport SIM since I was already covered for the things I use - rideshare apps, google maps, hotel/airline apps, messaging apps and regular sms. Would be nice to get even higher data speeds in places that have it, but it's still very much usable and useful.
Yea I have T-Mobile as well and like it quite a bit. Even if very few customers took advantage of this offering it gives you a sense of safety that taps into the same nerve center that something like the Amex Platinum and lounge access does.
If I’m traveling to another country, I might want a local number so that people in that country can call me from without incurring a long distance call charge.
Also, a lot of 2 factor verification systems have trouble messaging international numbers. A lot of the airport Wi-Fi’s I try to log into, for example, almost never succeed in sending me a pin on my international number.
Adding a roaming data plan to my existing number only solves a small number of the problems international travelers face. And even those problems are almost always resolved at a higher cost than getting a local SIM.
However my verizon "Travel Pass" has never ever worked in any country I've tried it in. Even when I ended up getting billed for.the $10/day to use it I still never had service.
On the other hand a 70gb
Vodafone SIM card was 10 euro and all I had to do was stick it in and wait 30 seconds.
It's good to have options, esp tried and true ones
This can be down to Settings. I traveled to Thailand and had similar issues with AT&Ts service. IIRC there may be 2 or even 3 separate 'roaming' type settings that need to be enabled for everything to work.
> Or maybe you land in a new country, the iPhone is like "hey I see you're in a new country, want a data package?"
And do you think you will always get the best prices/services compared to SIM cards sold to locals?
I don't think the incentives go that way. It's more like step 1) limit the visibility of the alternatives in the name of convenience/simplicity step 2) "these are not the alternatives you are looking for"
For the phone company, their best bet is that they'll nickel and dime you through roaming, if for some reason you need this exact phone number to receive calls.
If you just need to use your skype/google voice number , they know you don't need roaming, as a local company will be less expansive, but they can still try to push you towards their "friendly favored partner" (which bad prices due to generous revenue sharing agreement)
If your phone is unlocked and is not ESIM only, there's nothing they can do to let local competition deliver you the cheapest service
Carriers (at least of the non-MVNO kind) are far too burdened by the transnational legal frameworks of radio regulation to ever really be global. And various legal regulations on companies around the world don’t make it easier for telecommunications providers to form certain kinds of business arrangements.
The best we will ever get is if some MVNO gets a good enough deal on their global transit that they can provide some kind of global roaming service like that by way of agreements with physical carriers in many countries.
> Or maybe you land in a new country, the iPhone is like "hey I see you're in a new country, want a data package?"
Does having a SIM tray stop you from replying to that prompt?
> and you could just opt-in to something straight from your phone and be connected before you even get off the plane without needing to buy a disposable SIM card.
Does having a SIM tray remove your ability to choose?
Meanwhile, people use multiple SIMs even without leaving their home town as some mobile internet providers offer better services than bundled voice+internet services, having to use multiple cellphone numbers is a reality, and actually subscribing to separate services in multiple countries is a thing as well.
For instance, right now I have two SIM cards from two separate operators from two separate countries in one of my phones, and I would have a third if that was an option. Why is this suddenly a bad thing?
One sees this logical fallacy so often with Apple and its fans. It’s almost certainly encouraged by Apple as well.
Let’s say there’s a product that has 2 similar features A & B.
For its next version of the product Apple removes feature B.
Then folks complain about how there are things they cannot do because feature B is missing.
The Apple fans respond by extolling the benefits of feature A.
The problem is that I already had all those benefits of feature A when Apple shipped the product with both A and B. The Apple fans convert the actual argument, which is (A AND B) vs (Only A) into a strawman argument, which is (Only B) vs (Only A).
I think if folks really want the feature of a physical SIM card they have other phone options out there. Maybe it's something available from Samsung or Google? Personally I think going to another country and buying a disposable SIM card and hoping I don't lose my other one and all of these other things is much more of a hassle than something like landing, turning off airplane mode, and then just selecting a plan that works for me all set up with Apple Pay that I could have done before I even get off the plane.
Then again, just using a carrier that has global coverage would be even better.
> Does the target iPhone user in the US just not travel?
AT&T charges me $10/day up to $100/month for unlimited calls, texting, and data while overseas, virtually anywhere in the world. That's low enough I can't be bothered to go to the trouble of SIM purchase, swapping, and giving everyone my temporary number on arrival.
Says who? Unlimited plans from all major carriers top off at $70-80/mo. If you have multiple lines the per line cost is cheaper still (like $50/mo). Plans with data caps, discount carriers and MVNOs all go as low as $30/mo.
If you are paying $100+ for a cell phone plan in the US today you are being taken for a ride.
> Unlimited plans from all major carriers top off at $70-80/mo.
Until you add the $20-30 in taxes and fees they don’t show on their pricing page.
“Regulatory Charge”, “Admin & Telco Recovery Charge”, “Gross Receipts Surchg”, and “Fed Universal Service Charge”, and that doesn’t even include the state/local ones; they’re just Verizon’s set.
I pay $99.98/mo for 3 lines with unlimited talk and data, including 5G data and a smartwatch with cellular access - that includes taxes and fees, on the Verizon network. That's $29.99/line + $10 for the smart watch. No way in hell I would pay $100/line.
Ah, we've got a misunderstanding; you're right at the average. You've got a cell phone plan, with multiple lines, that's $100/month. Not $100/line, $100/plan.
Spectrum Mobile, you have to also be a spectrum internet customer. Before them I was on Visible (also Verizon), which was actually cheaper due to party pay but it was so heavily de-prioritized as to be unusable pretty frequently.
That's why there's lots of Android phones with double sim slots. I'm just adding a new one on arrival rather than swapping. And no need to give anyone a temporary number.
For lots of people $100 is a significant amount compared to a $5 prepaid sim they can get locally.
Now add up the cost of every one who’s trying to call you in the country you’re traveling to having to make an international call every time they call you.
And heaven forbid if they don’t have an iPhone. In some countries they’ll be charged large sums of money to text you as well.
I am not sure how true this is anymore, but it was in the US until at least a few years ago (and may still be on many carriers/plans) in many countries they would be charged for receiving texts from you as well.
That doesn't invalidate the point that services exist that allow you to buy e-sims all over the world if you're travelling. And if you're travelling a lot the price difference is miniscule compared to the cost of travel and accomodation.
I was referring to cheap part. It is 5 times more expensive than local sim, it is data only, doesn't have phone number I needed for local services. I am not sure hotspot is not blocked or not. The website doesn't say.
Hotspot isn't blocked. I'm using it right now. The reason it probably doesn't offer phone services is due to KYC stuff. Most governments love ID cards, address proofs and what not before they let you make phone calls. The data only esim bypasses all that. In fact, even the data is not locally terminated although you are using the local network. It terminates in their network (hosted by OVH in the EU at the moment). So it also effectively acts as a vpn. This is also great because most governments around the world have arbitrary censorship. Overall, I would say that it's a good product although the prices can be lower.
+1 airalo; esimdb.com is a great comparison engine for eSim vendors
be weary of the cheaper eSim providers, as they may not be using the best networks in a given country. Many do not disclose country specific network carriers, and others are hidden deep in documentation. Airalo is among the most transparent and has different vendors for their Global, EU, and country specific plans, with country specific packages usually having the best national carrier support.
I've spent a bit of time researching this in this past as Airalo wasn't usually the cheapest.
This prevents my day 1 purchase as well. My US carrier (Verizon Prepaid) doesn't support eSIM yet, and I don't want a postpaid plan. I see absolutely no reason removing the SIM slot at this time is in customers' interests.
Getting a model from Canada is an option, but those don't support mmWave 5G, and I'm often in areas where I'd actually use it.
US models support 5G mmWave, non-US models do not. So, the US models already have slightly higher cost.
The SIM tray adds manufacturing cost and complexity. It's also a structural weak point and makes waterproofing harder - which adds to warranty/applecare+ costs.
Therefore it's an easy cost-cutting move to get rid of the SIM tray on US models to bring the costs back in line.
I will say this: they should have kept the tray on the Pro Max models, which is what international travelers use.
> The SIM tray adds manufacturing cost and complexity. It's also a structural weak point and makes waterproofing harder - which adds to warranty/applecare+ costs.
Please explain then why I have been seeing iPhone 13 ads that showcase how it handles all sorts of drops and spills and sprinkles and kitchen hazards while sporting the SIM tray.
I love how Apple basically eliminated competition from competitors selling $20 headphones (oh no…you have to deal with a couple of wires…something Apple itself used as the signature motif in its ad campaigns for the iPods for a decade), so they could sell you the same thing for about 10 times the price (sure it has a slight convenience benefit but not everyone cares for it that much) and Apple’s fans will tie themselves into knots to explain how this is a good thing, as opposed to having both, so those who want to spend 10x for the convenience of no wires can do so and those who are happy buying cheap $10 earbuds from their local convenience store’s checkout counter display can also do so.
I didn't say it made waterproofing or structural integrity impossible.
It just makes it more difficult and therefore more expensive to manufacture.
Most people do not care about the SIM tray. There are apps that can get you e-sims for data in every country in the world.
Physical SIM cards are largely a liability. They need to be replaced as the network changes (as T-mobile had to for standalone 5G) and they make phone theft even more of a headache because phone thieves can take your SIM card and use it for SMS-based OTP and password resets.
SO many of the comments are so short-sighted. The minute Apple does something everyone else follows. Just because iPhone isn't the majority in other countries doesn't mean every single new Android phone won't also exclude physical SIMs and thus force telcos everywhere to adopt eSIMs.
Does this open the door to potential IMEI randomization? That could prove to be a privacy improvement for American travelers to countries who are much more aggressive with tracking people around with their phones
>dual esim
why why why why why why why is this a thing. Pleeeaaaase, why why why limit it to 2. I'm sure there is no unovercomable reason to just make that like 20
You do realize that number of simultaneous connections to different networks is an actual hardware thing, not just an arbitrary limit, right ? And what's the use case for more than 2 at the same time ?
In the US, ATT + VZW = generally good service everywhere
If you preferent results to excuses, you get a dual sim phone and use whichever line has the most bars (I keep a Tmobile 5G access point for my computer stuff)
Yes, I do know that is a hardware thing, but I am pretty sure you already connect to more than 2 towers at the same time, even with a single sim. As for, what is the point of more than 2 at the same time. There are already plenty of people who use 2 sims to, for example, separate work and personal life, or personal stuff, and stuff like microsofts stupid 2 factor. Also, when traveling, it would be great to be able to add more sims, without disconnecting your previous sims, which may be connected to subscriptions which you might want to keep running, though, to be honest, I don't know much about how stuff like that works with esims. Even if you could only have 1 or 2 active at the same time, lots of esims you can switch on or off would be great. Also, having a bunch of burner prepaid sims which you can turn on and off is really nice.
> lots of esims you can switch on or off would be great
I believe this is already supported. Haven't used esims extensively, but I see toggles for activating them on android. Not sure if there's a limit there. The real limit is only how many can be active at the same time.
I see this leading to a huge spike in the prevalence of SIM-swapping scams. I can’t remember the last time I needed to have my carrier move my number from one SIM card to another, but if this becomes the norm I’ll need to ask them do it for me every time I get a new phone. Or am I missing something?
The old iphone can transfer the sim to another iphone using local radios and a 2PC involving the UI on the two phones (like airdrop, but for simcards).
I think the downsides of travel are being overblown, moving overseas however would present a problem if one is moving to a 3rd world country or China.
Currently 82 countries have eSim support for iPhone, typically it is poorer countries that don't have eSim support.
More reasonably one would utilise an inexpensive worldwide provider such as TruPhone for travelling - there are currently 15 worldwide eSim providers for iPhones.
I wonder if you can run dual eSIM.
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