Just an FYI, as I have dug pretty deep on this one. IF you have an actively dual SIM iPhone, and one of those carriers is ATT, and you have an ATT purchased Apple Watch, then ATT will not release the Apple Watch eSIM to be populated by another carrier so you can have both/the other carrier supported on your wrist.
So I can confirm that if you have a Verizon purchased Apple Watch and wish to have ATT added to the Apple Watch, then that is not only possible, but I have done it for my wife’s watch. If my dual-sim iPhone were two ATT lines, I can have both lines populated to the ATT purchased Apple Watch to choose between, if say, one number is Home and the other number is Work. What I CANNOT do is add any carrier BUT ATT to an ATT purchased Apple Watch which is paired to a dual Sim iPhone where ATT is one of the carriers.
According to the Apple engineers I spoke with, ATT is the only major carrier that disallows populating multiple CARRIER profiles to the Apple Watch they sell if the numbers are from any carrier besides themselves. This is apparently a policy issue, and NOT technical at all, as any North American Apple Watch is technically capable of providing the service. I can attest that a Verizon purchased Apple Watch will do it, and apparently Sprint and T-Mobile can host multiple carriers to the Apple Watch eSIM as well. Only ATT is an outlier.
The solution to this dilemma is actually fairly easy if you completely own the ATT Apple Watch (no payment installments remain with ATT). Simply unpair and remove the ATT assigned contract and re-pair to the supported alternative carrier. Then, once the contract is established, re-add the ATT line as a secondary at which point ATT will provision the service to, in my case, the exact same device, now policy owned by Verizon and no longer designated as an ATT purchased device covered by their policy ban.
I realize there may be only five people who read this who find this information helpful, but if I can help someone from descending into the support crossfire that exists between Apple and multiple hosted carriers associated with heterogeneous dual sim iPhone/Apple Watch configurations, then I feel it’s worth the information sharing. Have fun everyone!
So I can confirm that if you have a Verizon purchased Apple Watch and wish to have ATT added to the Apple Watch, then that is not only possible, but I have done it for my wife’s watch. If my dual-sim iPhone were two ATT lines, I can have both lines populated to the ATT purchased Apple Watch to choose between, if say, one number is Home and the other number is Work. What I CANNOT do is add any carrier BUT ATT to an ATT purchased Apple Watch which is paired to a dual Sim iPhone where ATT is one of the carriers.
According to the Apple engineers I spoke with, ATT is the only major carrier that disallows populating multiple CARRIER profiles to the Apple Watch they sell if the numbers are from any carrier besides themselves. This is apparently a policy issue, and NOT technical at all, as any North American Apple Watch is technically capable of providing the service. I can attest that a Verizon purchased Apple Watch will do it, and apparently Sprint and T-Mobile can host multiple carriers to the Apple Watch eSIM as well. Only ATT is an outlier.
The solution to this dilemma is actually fairly easy if you completely own the ATT Apple Watch (no payment installments remain with ATT). Simply unpair and remove the ATT assigned contract and re-pair to the supported alternative carrier. Then, once the contract is established, re-add the ATT line as a secondary at which point ATT will provision the service to, in my case, the exact same device, now policy owned by Verizon and no longer designated as an ATT purchased device covered by their policy ban.
I realize there may be only five people who read this who find this information helpful, but if I can help someone from descending into the support crossfire that exists between Apple and multiple hosted carriers associated with heterogeneous dual sim iPhone/Apple Watch configurations, then I feel it’s worth the information sharing. Have fun everyone!
