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Yeah I think this move is going to prove to be a mistake on Apple's part. Many people are liekly open to eSim while keeping the option for a physical sim, but I bet far less people are comfortable with getting rid of the physical sim altogether.
Mistake? How so? A few thousand people in the states stopped buying iPhone? They don’t care. It is what it is.
 
Did you try or you are just assuming? I just did a physical sim to esim transfer in under a minute for free. Also did a esim to esim transfer when I got a new replacement phone also in s minute with no issues. So far I have not heard of any carrier attempting to charge for physical sim to esim transfer.

They may or may not charge money but having to actually deal with Verizon or AT&T on the phone is payment enough in itself.
 
This is a great information, thank you so much for that. I wish Apple would tell this to the customers too if they are so much about privacy. I’m always sceptical to everything Apple says especially about privacy and this is a bit fishy.
iPhones already share the IMEI with the carrier when using physical SIM cards so for iPhones there is no loss of privacy here by using an eSIM ( just the loss of on-demand portability by swapping the physical card)
 
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I'm just astonished at how much Apple has become so arrogant. Serioulsy, has anyone here in the past few months tried to activate an eSim with any carrier in the US? Well, I have tried many times with Verizon and T-Mobile and I have to say it's a nightmare!! Yes, surely they may have fixed and trained the carriers here in the US to activate eSims, but, can you imagine going to somewhere like Greece (Trust me, I was there and tried with Cosmote - impossible), Ghana, Guatemala etc where there is perhaps no such thing as an eSim or, you simply can't speak the language to activate an eSim at the local corner store?
i agree, in my last trip to Guatemala I wanted to try eSim, but Claro and Tigo only carries physicial Sim. But I'm from Canada, so we still have physical Sim on iPhones :)
 
I moved my sim to esim last night on my phone to get ready for my iPhone 14. I did it on the app for my prover. I didn't need to call anyone. I had an issue with the esim downloading, but it was fixed in a few minutes by chatting with support.
 
Yeah I think this move is going to prove to be a mistake on Apple's part. Many people are liekly open to eSim while keeping the option for a physical sim, but I bet far less people are comfortable with getting rid of the physical sim altogether.
The floppy drive, cd drive, and headphone jack have entered the chat ...
 
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No way around it. Buy from Apple directly and pay in full or switch carriers and buy from Apple and pay in full or carrier financing.
Thanks, I will buying direct and unlocked next time. The carrier deals look good until you run into issues like this.
 
AT&T is extremely greedy and I'm saying this as an AT&T customer who just switched to them due to T-Mobile having extremely poor service in the area I recently moved to.

There's no end to their greed.

Like you said, if you pay off early you'll lose your trade-in credits, essentially giving them your old phone for free.
T-Mobile will just keep adding the credits to your bill until you've received all of the credits.

Decent carriers will temporarily unlock your phone for foreign travel, AT&T simply states that you should buy their roaming plan:



AT&T is also the only carrier that will lock the Apple SIM, that came/comes with iPads, to themselves so you can't easily switch without having to get a new Apple SIM.


Anyways, sorry for the rant.
There is no solution other than purchasing an extra phone to use for international travel or testing purposes.
That's good to know about T-Mobile still issuing the credits. They are finally coming to my area so I'll need to see how the coverage is. For now my only choices are AT&T and U.S. Cellular.
 
That's AT&T problem. You'll be facing that with eSIM or physical SIM phones. Should've bought direct from Apple in full.
I agree buying direct and unlocked is best. The trouble is Apple will give you $300 as a trade in for your old and AT&T and the other carriers $1000.
 
286+ posts with most up in arms about the loss of the good consumer OPTION to use a SIM card, especially valuable when traveling but here's the question:

For all complaining, are you buying anyway?

If you buy anyway, Apple made the right decision. Buying anyway rewards Apple for making such "courageous" decisions. Griping for those who buy anyway is just venting. Apple still gets every seller benefit from those who may gripe loudest but then lays the money down for one.

If enough make this a dealbreaker issue, Apple gets to actually learn a lesson... and could then respond by bringing international phones into the US as alternatives (with SIM) or up to reviving SIM in the North American model next year "due to overwhelming customer demand."

What Apple wants most is to what all companies want most: to maximize revenue & profit. If buying anyway does that, all decisions Apple makes appear to be right. Voting with wallet actually works if the masses decide an issue- like this one- motivates them to NOT reward a decision.

Else, pay up, enjoy your new phone and deal with the issues and added expense when traveling outside of North America. 50,000 posts griping about this from people who buy anyway won't change a thing.
 
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Well, what's done is done. Thanks Apple.

I have enjoyed being able to swap a physical SIM between my iPhone (used for work calls) and my iPad - when I want to do work away from WiFi. This capability seems to be over with.

Fortunately, T-Mobile has some new international roaming features that allows me to use my existing service without a need to get a local SIM. My international travel is usually only for a week or so, 5GB of data is fine.

Some places that are physical SIM-only are also places where you don't necessarily want to be carrying your new $1300 iPhone 14 Pro Max out in the open. I'm not promoting Apple's change to eSIM, but you may be better off finding a used iPhone for like $200. You don't want to become a target with your expensive phone out in the open, especially if you travel often. You're better off just investing in an older used phone for international travel. You can still take the new phone (better camera!).
 
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Yes but the option to have those as eSIM already existed. Now if you do have to have a SIM, well Apple has good news for you. You no longer have to deal with SIM cards!

This is the real problem. They couldn’t even pull a Schiller and say yeah we know it sucks now but we’re doing this to improve the market. No, they just said we’re all too dumb and clumsy to handle SIM cards so like children they are taking the option away.
Apple has been trying to get the industry to move to eSIM for at least half a decade, maybe more.

I have no skin in the game as I rarely travel and only have one plan for my phone, so I never swap SIM cards. I think I like the protection of not having to worry about someone getting my phone and taking my SIM card so they get access to my SMS-2FA accounts, but even that's a stretch to have to worry about.

I think of it like this. If there's no one pushing for eSIM, we're never going to get them. The industry never moves unless a big player forces them to. In this case, Apple is big enough to drive the entire industry to eSIM. It's going to happen.

Ironically, the whole Lightning vs. USB-C thing is similar, but from the opposite end. Apple fighting the inevitability of USB-C/standard port for over a decade is quite a comparison to the SIM debate.
 
282+ posts with most up in arms about the loss of the good consumer OPTION to use a SIM card, especially valuable when traveling but here's the question:

For all complaining, are you buying anyway?

If you buy anyway, Apple made the right decision. Buying anyway rewards Apple for making such "courageous" decisions. Griping for those who buy anyway is just venting. Apple still gets every seller benefit from those who may gripe loudest but then lays the money down for one.

If enough make this a dealbreaker issue, Apple gets to actually learn a lesson... and could then respond by bringing international phones into the US as alternatives (with SIM) or up to reviving SIM in the North American model next year "due to overwhelming customer demand."

What Apple wants most is to what all companies want most: to maximize revenue & profit. If buying anyway does that, all decisions Apple makes appear to be right. Voting with wallet actually works if the masses decide an issue- like this one- motivates them to NOT reward a decision.

Else, pay up, enjoy your new phone and deal with the issues and added expense when traveling outside of North America. 50,000 posts griping about this from people who buy anyway won't change a thing.
I can tell you as far as US goes. This is a none issue for the majority of people. They will continue to buy.
 
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You don't have to suffer, unless it's your own choice. Literally the only eSIM only iPhones are the US iPhone 14 series. The rest of the iPhone lineup and non-US iPhone 14 still sport the SIM tray as usual. If you specifically bought the US iPhone 14 while knowing you would be inconvenienced by the lack of SIM slot, that's on you. :)
I did buy 5 taiwan iPhone pro max.

It will still be troublesome to activate due to 2FA.

How many in US really knows the pain when they show up in country without esim support for prepaid?

It’s still hard to get your hands on international version. I still need to arrange for phones to be shipped to my dad house in Taiwan and wait until my next trip. Not to mention activating and 2FA while overseas.

All could be done much easier if apple offers both. As far for other consumer- just wait when Japan officially open in 3 weeks. Someone is bound to show up with brick iPhone 14/14po.
 
Let’s be real - carrier availability is a niche issue. Hardly any Americans travel abroad let alone regularly and the ones that do, MOST use roaming, not buy and swap out SIM cards. So the problem of going to East Africa and not being able to swap out a SIM is quite frankly NICHE.

What this will do, at the expense of that tiny tiny minority of people being inconvenienced, is get networks around the world in a war footing and realise this is coming globally and they need to adapt to eSIM or, frankly, die as customers will disappear to the networks who do.

That has long term gain for short term pain.

Time to evolve!
Gain from whose perspective

Infrastructure isn’t private in all countries either.

Some of the issue is government policy too.

As great of power apple has, it’s not all mighty that can influence every single country policies.

The mere fact Apple offers physical sim already give you a problem.

So you are saying to people owns us iPhone 14/14 pro to never travel to China and Japan for work/pleasure?
 
It’s a slow rollout for sure. But you can safely bet that 2-3 years from now all iPhones will be eSIM only.

The loss of headphone jack, absence of charging brick. So many jerk moves by Apple, yet the whole industry seems to follow suit.
Unless Xi dies- China will never allow esim under his watch.

Apple isn’t leaving China market.
 
Come on, enough of this traveling excuses. If you are an avid traveler and know you will need physical SIM slot, why would you torture yourself by buying an eSIM only iPhone? An avid traveler would've been wiser, and either import a non-US iPhone 14, or use any other phones (all iPhones prior to the 14 still have SIM slots).

For the lay people, they would just use any of the global eSIM providers and move on. You can argue about the cost, but a lay user that rarely travels wouldn't be bothered with that details in the first place. Many people are still opting for roaming through their respective home carriers, even before eSIM existed.

The biggest annoyance about eSIM is actually from iPhone users in countries like mine, where we paid premium price for a dual SIM capable (nano+eSIM) iPhone that is practically a single SIM device since majority of our carriers don't support eSIM. If Apple's decision hasten the carriers to support eSIM, it's good news for us.
Simple, this is 2022 and I refuse to carry two phones. You're entitle to your own opinion so am I. Apple needs to come clean and call out that eSim is not availed yet in all international markets for pre paid plans on that ''eSim page''. That's what the issue is. I realize that a large % of Americans dont leave the mainland. For those who do, I personally won't be forced down the throat to pay outrageous roaming fees with $hitty data packages and service when abroad.
 
General question here. I'm upgrading from an XS (physical SIM) to a 14 Pro (eSIM) - both are unlocked but I use AT&T. Last time I upgraded, I just switched the physical SIM from my iPhone 8 to the XS and restored my apps and data from a backup (connected to a mac via USB).

My question is what order do I set up the new phone most efficiently? Do I have to transfer the SIM info onto the eSIM before I can do anything else, or do I restore from my XS backup (using USB to my Mac) first, then worry about activating the phone?

Thanks for any help - it's been 4 years since I had to worry about this.
 
You don't need a local carrier. I've used Ubigi's eSim data roaming plan in several countries. Pricing is very reasonable, cheaper than other roaming rates.

The remaining problem is not having a local number since only few global eSim providers offer that. WhatsApp or other non sms messaging apps can partially overcome this.

Try that with grab and DiDi. Does it work?

Be realistic. You will need local number especially for transportation
 
Except they are normally country locked and need 10 mins of calls logged on local sim 1st before they are unlocked international

You will need a local friend in Malaysia to assist else its a problem

Buy from Taiwan. All iPhones in Taiwan are unlocked from day one.
 
1. You can definitely use Uber without a local number if you have data. If you got an international number registered to your account Uber will use the in-app calling feature. Essentially acting like WhatsApp. I know because I used to roam in the US as I live overseas and had a good roaming plan on my line.

Still, I now do prefer local always. It makes everything much easier and I like having more data for cheaper and a low latency connection.

2. I agree tbh. I understand that Airalo and other similar services maybe a good fit for some but these services don’t fit my usage at all. Also very expensive for the little they offer
Item 1 is hit and miss. Last month in Taiwan it took uber 30 minutes to route the driver call to us and call me. (I forgot to change the number).
 
Not from the US so I don't have to worry about it right now, but I have used eSIM internationally for years now without much problems. Of course, the countries that I'm going to might differ from the countries that you're going to, so ymmv. But for example Germany and Japan are both on my top list of countries where I've been to many times, and you can find many excellent eSIMs for usage there (both as tourist and as resident, both with and without contract). I really have to doubt where you guys/gals are looking.

Anyway, you're Apple customers right? Have some courage.

1. Japan is straight lie. Because all carriers in Japan ESIM are reserved for local contract plan. You need legal residency.

2. We aren’t talking about universal esim.

Either you lied or you didn’t understand the issue.
 
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