Apple Removes SIM Card Tray on All iPhone 14 Models in U.S.

[Fat_Guy]

Fyi it's better to stick to stuff actually sold by best buy and not random sellers on the marketplace.

I would say so. Walmart sells iPhones up here also but usually the lower end and refurbished. Be careful and make sure you are buying the phone directly from Bestbuy.ca - the store - as on-line they can send you to third party sellers. Bestbuy sells almost everything you find in the Apple store and that is why I only mention them.

 

[lartola]

Any implications for U.S. AT&T customers using AT&T's International Day Pass for foreign roaming? A lot of conflicting comments upthread re: international availability of eSIM. Thanks.

No problem there. eSIM users can roam just fine on the networks of carriers that still don’t support eSIM; the problem would be only for the customers of those unsupporting carriers, who can’t activate service using the eSIM on their iphones. This is Similar to how apple pay users from a supported country could still use Apple Pay on contactless card readers while traveling in an unsupported country.

 

[lartola]

The issue here is would you rather pay the premium for keeping access to your ATT phone number while roaming...

or pay for a local eSIM and the data for that in the country you would be in, which would be substantially cheaper, and use FaceTime Audio to make those calls back to the US. Options need to be judged here before looking at the convenience of simply keeping your number, which you would get back once you get back into the US.

BL.

That depends on the user’s plan and where the user is traveling. The Unlimited voice and data plans offered by the three big US carriers usually include free roaming in Canada and Mexico, for example, and affordable roaming plans for other regions.

 

[spacedcadet]

Only one carrier in th UK supports eSIMs. Guess that's why we're keeping the slot. Also, the Apple tax is outrageous. £1099 UK price v £869 US price even at today's HISTORIC LOW £/$ exchange rate.

 

[lartola]

Have fun traveling basically anywhere outside the US then ...😅

Not necessarily. If you’re using roaming, then no problem: eSIM iphones can still roam internationally on the same networks as their SIM card predecessors regardless of whether or not the carriers who operate those networks support eSIM activations for their own customers. If you prefer to activate service locally wherever you travel then it might be an issue in some countries, though many already have carriers that activate eSIMs.

 

[lartola]

That's so funny. So American iphone owners can have an accident in the desert and be able to call a satellite, but they can't travel outside the country and pick up a local sim card. Pffft somebody in Apple is having a laugh. Anyway, hopefully this will gradually get all the network providers to travel towards esim and in the meantime, the rest of the world doesn't need to suffer

It seems to me that Apple is considering US iphone owners who travel internationally to be too small a market to worry about them. After all, the overwhelming majority of americans very rarely, if at all, travel outside their country.

 

[pdoherty]

A phone without a SIM tray is complete trash. There is no easier way of switching the number than switching the SIM card.

There is no danger that someone else could steal your phone and use it with his own SIM unless he has exactly the same face as you.

And, I'm not an expert on eSIM but making the SIM digital instead of physical seems to add risk of being hacked and your cell number being stolen. Which is how thieves get into bank accounts and other private sites - many of those sites are set to send a text as a secondary authentication step, and those texts would go to the criminal with your eSIM instead of you. This possibility is why I called my carrier a couple of years ago and told them to never change my SIM by phone, only by me showing up at one of their stores in person with ID.

 

[rs0212]

It looks like the Canadian models contain all the LTE & 5G bands as the US models, but also have a physical SIM card tray. I live an hour away from the Canadian border. Am I correct in thinking that I could go to Canada, buy an unlocked iPhone over there for full price and only be giving up mmWave (which I don't have in my area anyway)?

 

[Fat_Guy]

“It looks like the Canadian models contain all the LTE & 5G bands as the US models, but also have a physical SIM card tray. I live an hour away from the Canadian border. Am I correct in thinking that I could go to Canada, buy an unlocked iPhone over there for full price and only be giving up mmWave (which I don't have in my area anyway)?”



Yup, pretty much spot on and the satellite stuff and two free years is the same.

 

[Spaceboi Scaphandre]

Android phones will be following shortly, mark my words.

Samsung and Google will yeah. Samsung will even mock Apple for the move then copy them a month later.

The majority of Androids don't follow suit thankfully, as evident from the sheer number of them that still have headphone jacks.

 

[PLin]

It looks like the Canadian models contain all the LTE & 5G bands as the US models, but also have a physical SIM card tray. I live an hour away from the Canadian border. Am I correct in thinking that I could go to Canada, buy an unlocked iPhone over there for full price and only be giving up mmWave (which I don't have in my area anyway)?

That's what I'm considering doing, since I can also easily drive to Canada, but for the model I want (14 Pro 256GB), I have to factor in that the phone costs slightly more between the higher price (after currency conversion, it would be $1,181 vs. $1,099 for the US model) and the higher 13% HST vs. my 8.75% sales tax in the US. It could also be subject to duty when returning to the US if you don't stay in Canada for more than 48 hours. And then there's the warranty issue... Swapping the screen is probably doable, but if the entire device needs replacement, I'm not sure if the US Apple Stores can get you another one with a physical SIM slot.

 

[pdoherty]

Huh? A physical SIM is less secure. A thief can simply take it out and put it in his own phone and misuse the number (for OTPs, etc). eSIM is safer as there's no way for a thief to take it out. And if he wanted to use his own SIM, there are Apple's built-in security to deal with (activation lock).

A thief would have to have your phone to take the physical SIM out. That's a lot larger hurdle than an all-digital SIM.

 

[Fat_Guy]

That's what I'm considering doing, since I can also easily drive to Canada, but for the model I want (14 Pro 256GB), I have to factor in that the phone costs slightly more between the higher price (after currency conversion, it would be $1,181 vs. $1,099 for the US model) and the higher 13% HST vs. my 8.75% sales tax in the US. It could also be subject to duty when returning to the US if you don't stay in Canada for more than 48 hours. And then there's the warranty issue... Swapping the screen is probably doable, but if the entire device needs replacement, I'm not sure if the US Apple Stores can get you another one with a physical SIM slot.

You have to pay the sales tax - but how many would declare the phone at the border? I of course would as I’m sure you would, but other other “bad” people probably would not. 🤣

 

[technole]

Not quite. Afaik when carriers in the US didn’t use SIMs they also were the only ones selling handsets either directly to the public or through authorized dealers. That meant a carrier would usually refuse to activate service on any handset not purchased from that carrier. Also, unlocked phones did not exist at the time, all phones were carrier locked.

All of them were unlockable at the end of contract, and you could bring-your-own. CDMA was intertwined with the subsidized phone and service for X years era.

The fact is Qualcomm's CDMA was ahead of it's time with SIM-less configuration using IMEI swaps online, and eSIM is similar in that a registry in the phone that can handle several phone numbers and plans, albeit only 2 active at-once on iPhone but that can change in the future.

 

[bradl]

Well- I am out of iPhone 14 then.

I travel every 2 months or so. Esim is not easy to get (doable). But pain in the ass to enable.

Even in Taiwan- you can only get physical sim for traveler. I often travel to 7-10 plus countries a year. Just way too much pain for esim. Good luck enabling esim at airports.

I already know I can’t do this in Singapore, Japan, and Taiwan. **** apple

You obviously haven’t traveled outside US.

Take the 3 countries I visit most often for example

1. Singapore- no esim from local carrier for tourists unless it’s ****** M1. For eSIM, I will have to sign up a contract- with much worse pricing. Right now $40SGD gets me 5000 minutes and 180GB 5G data for 3 months.

And I am not sure I can even get a local plan.

2. Taiwan on the other hand has 0 tourist ESIM. Only direct store can activate esim for local plan. You can’t even activate at airport.

3. Japan- same as top 2.

Esim isn’t like you said can be activated easily. Unless you pay 3rd party esim provider. But why I would pay $100 to airalo to get worse data and voice plan.

Apple greed is clear. They will probably jump into providing cellular service line airalo.

This basically is a long term money grab.

Esim is not easy to use and activate especially for people for travel a lot.

Umm...

Find wireless carriers and worldwide service providers that offer eSIM service on iPhone - Apple Support

An eSIM is a digital SIM that allows you to activate a mobile data plan from your network provider without having to use a physical nano-SIM. Find out which wireless carriers in your country or region offer cellular plans on an eSIM, either activated by eSIM Carrier Activation, eSIM Quick...

support.apple.com

Everywhere you travel is supported. If you're looking for something prepaid, or explicitly saying tourist, of course they may try to get you into something else. Like I mentioned before with my friends that came up from Australia, they still ended up getting a local number up here instead of staying with their Australian number, which worked out to be cheaper for the entire time they were here. The same should be able to work for you overseas.

BL.

 

[SactoGuy18]

I wouldn't be surprised that both Canada and Mexican cellphone carriers will allow the use the eSIM's within the next year or so. Telus, Rogers and Bell may probably do so by the end of 2022.

 

[ian87w]

The only eSIM I know of is the M1 Prepaid Tourist SIM, which is good for 7 days. My problem is that I go to Singapore for 6 weeks at a time and have always purchased a physical prepaid SIM. Now I don't know what to do. I don't even think you can top up the tourist SIM, so I would have to go to the store every week to buy a new one.

Yeah this is the weird thing about Singapore. They rely a lot on tourism and foreign travelers, but the carriers seem to be acting so backwards in regards to eSIM. Apple should try to convince them, seeing that they habe three Apple stores in that tiny island country.

 

[Open-Source-Norange]

Welp, I was seriously considering this phone in the future because of its features, but I guess that's a crapshoot.

I am gonna stay with Android, they would never make dumb decisions like these to benefit mobile carriers and to look "sleek".

 

[dk001]

Reading through all of these, I suspect we are going to have to see how this really works out.
If, the eSIM design becomes more fleshed out and proliferates I think this will be a good thing.

However, what was Apple’s real motivation? That is the aspect we don’t have.

I tried converting to eSIM on my 13 ProMax (AT&T) and use the tray when traveling however the eSIM did have a few infrequent issues. General use was not as dependable as the current SIM card.

I can remember the iPhone having issues with eSIM earlier this year regarding iMessage and FaceTime.

 

[bradl]

I wouldn't be surprised that both Canada and Mexican cellphone carriers will allow the use the eSIM's within the next year or so. Telus, Rogers and Bell may probably do so by the end of 2022.

From the list posted, the three you mentioned already support it. For Mexico, ATT and Movistar already do.

BL.

 

[jk73]

No problem there. eSIM users can roam just fine on the networks of carriers that still don’t support eSIM; the problem would be only for the customers of those unsupporting carriers, who can’t activate service using the eSIM on their iphones. This is Similar to how apple pay users from a supported country could still use Apple Pay on contactless card readers while traveling in an unsupported country.

Excellent. When people said some carriers didn't support eSIM, I thought that meant eSIM users couldn't connect to such carriers at all. Thanks.

 

[jk73]

And, I'm not an expert on eSIM but making the SIM digital instead of physical seems to add risk of being hacked and your cell number being stolen. Which is how thieves get into bank accounts and other private sites - many of those sites are set to send a text as a secondary authentication step, and those texts would go to the criminal with your eSIM instead of you. This possibility is why I called my carrier a couple of years ago and told them to never change my SIM by phone, only by me showing up at one of their stores in person with ID.

Is this a real-world problem already or just a theoretical one?

If one is concerned, what's the highest amount of account security one can request with AT&T? Are there options beyond just the account pass code? Thanks.

 

[Fat_Guy]

I wouldn't be surprised that both Canada and Mexican cellphone carriers will allow the use the eSIM's within the next year or so. Telus, Rogers and Bell may probably do so by the end of 2022.

Haha. My 12 Pro Max was activated a few weeks after launch with a Rogers eSim. I then put a OneSimCard sim in the tray. Forcing eSim on you is unethical. But then you know I’m a privacy advocate.

 

[bradl]

Haha. My 12 Pro Max was activated a few weeks after launch with a Rogers eSim. I then put a OneSimCard sim in the tray. Forcing eSim on you is unethical. But then you know I’m a privacy advocate.

they aren't forcing anything. I mean, this is no different than when Verizon and Sprint had no sims in their phones and were totally eSIM at the time because of their network being CDMA. Verizon and Sprint customers weren't complaining then.

BL.

 

[SactoGuy18]

Haha. My 12 Pro Max was activated a few weeks after launch with a Rogers eSim. I then put a OneSimCard sim in the tray. Forcing eSim on you is unethical. But then you know I’m a privacy advocate.

I'm not a complete fan of eSIM given T-Mobile US' troubles earlier this year with their eSIM setup on iPhones. I may stay with my iPhone 12 for a while, including eventually replacing the battery and doing a from-scratch install of the latest version of iOS.