esim cards in phones

[Alan]

Does anyone have experience in using esims instead of or as well as a physical sim in their phone?

Yesterday we bought new iPhones and while talking with the incredibly helpful and personable salesman at the Apple store we told him that we planned on holding onto one of the phones to give to our daughter when she moves here next phone.

When we moved over in 2016 we immediately switched the sim in my wife's phone to a UK provider and I kept my US provider sim for a few months. (we had planned to spend 6 months in UK and USA going forward).

He said why don't we get her to sign up with a UK provider using an esim and he said that is what he does. He is from Cyprus and he showed us his phone which showed 2 providers, his Cyprus provider and his UK provider (happened to be Vodafone). He said it was really useful for him because his family could call him on his regular Cyprus number.

Does anyone here have any experience using esims?

 

[braumeister]

New iPhones have eSIMs by default, and from now on I believe there will not even be a slot for a physical SIM card. So it's a done deal already.

My previous iPhone and my current one were both eSIM only. It seems to be the way of the future.

 

[Alan]

New iPhones have eSIMs by default, and from now on I believe there will not even be a slot for a physical SIM card. So it's a done deal already.

My previous iPhone and my current one were both eSIM only. It seems to be the way of the future.

The ones we bought yesterday (13s) have a physical card slot into which we transferred the SIM card from our provider, O2. O2 does support the ESIM so I think we should be able to tell our daughter to sign up with an ESIM and her iPhone will support her existing physical SIM as well as the ESIM.

I'm obviously behind the times on this cool stuff

 

[PaunchyPirate]

I just got my first exposure to an esim on Wednesday when my new iPhone 14 arrived.

The phone does indeed have capability for 2 sims and it is all done via internal hardware/software. There is not even a slot on the phone for a physical SIM card.

I am looking forward to using it when I travel internationally without having to swap a card in and out.

I did have the most issues ever in changing from one phone to another. Although I don't know if the esim had anything to do with it. But the guy at Verizon complained about esims while he was helping me fix the issue.

Basically, while I was setting up the iPhone 14, it was supposed to be held next to my iPhone XS Max and magically set itself up, including switching the Verizon service over. Well, the Verizon switch failed. Just said it could not be done. Then the rest of the magic worked fine. So now the new phone was all up and running with all the Apple stuff, but it didn't have phone service. I tried to manually activate it using various bits of info I could find on the Verizon website, but none of them worked. Most of the online help still refers to a physical SIM card. And the online forms that you are directed to to do an activation want you to enter a 20 digit SIM card identifier. Well, an esim doesn't have that number. I tried to get through on the phone to Verizon, but their system wasn't letting me thru at all. It keeps directing you to online processes. It even sends you a text message link to use for the activation, but again, it wasn't set up for esim.

After 90 minutes of dead ends, I went into a local Verizon store. The guy first told me I had to do this via phone support. I explained how I had tried that. So he took pity on me and said he would see if he could do it. After about 10 minutes, he had my service switched over to the new phone. But he said "we have a lot of problems with this new esim approach."

I left there happy, but got unhappy again when I checked my account online and found that he had switched my plan somehow to a more expensive plan plus had wiped out my entire data for the month, so it was at 0gb of data remaining. But I tried to call Verizon again, and for this problem I was able to speak with someone. They put me back on the right plan, and just gave me a full bucket of data as if it were a new month. Then he also credited my account for one month of service. The credit was inadvertent, but he said he was just going to leave it there since removing it was more of a hassle than it was worth.

So, all together, my painless switchover took about 3 hours of time. Worst ever for me. But it's all working now.

And hopefully, the esim wasn't really the cause of all these problems. The concept of esim is a great one. But not all carriers support it yet. I'm sure they are all going that direction though. It's the future.

 

[braumeister]

Advantages include not having to go to a physical store to buy a SIM card when you want to change (or wait for one to be delivered in the mail). It's becoming common for phones to support two or more eSIMs, which is great for travelers.

A Guide To eSIMS/

 

[MichaelB]

So, is it safe to assume with an esim it wouldn’t be possible to quickly remove the sim and [-]swallow[/-] destroy it? Asking for a friend

 

[Alan]

So, is it safe to assume with an esim it wouldn’t be possible to quickly remove the sim and [-]swallow[/-] destroy it? Asking for a friend

So funny

 

[REWahoo]

So, is it safe to assume with an esim it wouldn’t be possible to quickly remove the sim and [-]swallow[/-] destroy it? Asking for a friend

Probably for the best since those things taste terrible. According to a friend.

 

[Alan]

Probably for the best since those things taste terrible. According to a friend.

And so scratchy on the way out.

 

[zinger1457]

Haven't done it yet but was told that an esim is the way to go if travelling internationally and you need cellular and/or data service because your current carrier doesn't support that area. Can purchase the esim online and have it ready to go when you arrive, rather than having to find a store when you're on the ground to purchase a physical sim.

 

[braumeister]

Can purchase the esim online and have it ready to go when you arrive, rather than having to find a store when you're on the ground to purchase a physical sim.

Yes, typically you can just scan a QR code and get hooked up with an account in a couple of minutes.

My phone can store eight eSIMs and I can activate any two of them at the same time.

 

[Sunset]

Advantages include not having to go to a physical store to buy a SIM card when you want to change (or wait for one to be delivered in the mail). It's becoming common for phones to support two or more eSIMs, which is great for travelers.

A Guide To eSIMS/

And great for scammers wanting to steal your phone number. No longer do they need a physical sim card....

 

[Richard4444]

And great for scammers wanting to steal your phone number. No longer do they need a physical sim card....

How is this done? It would be horrible as in 2 factor ID?

Rich

 

[Trailwalker]

Haven't done it yet but was told that an esim is the way to go if travelling internationally and you need cellular and/or data service because your current carrier doesn't support that area. Can purchase the esim online and have it ready to go when you arrive, rather than having to find a store when you're on the ground to purchase a physical sim.

Yes, I did that for Peru last month. I bought an Airalo esim for $15 (3 gig of data for 30 days). I only used about a gig but had coverage in some very remote places. Much cheaper than Verizon's international data.

 

[camfused]

^^^ So my understanding is that the local esim does data only in that country. You set your phone up to do Wi-Fi calling (before you leave your home country). The local esim provides sort of a hotspot that your home sim uses to make the calls… to the phone, it is just like you are at home. Do I have this right?

 

[Lagniappe]

I have a T-Mobile e-sim, and a Vodafone physical sim here in Portugal. I have my phone set up so that after I dial a number it asks which sim I want to use. I can also switch settings so that the data used is from a specifically identified sim. Setup with T-Mobile was painful, but it has been very handy. No more multiple phones, no more removing sim cards

 

[Trailwalker]

I came across reports for Verizon (my home carrier) being somewhat difficult to setup for home phone number wifi calling use (with a second active esim) and people getting charged high international rates when it wasn't set up correctly.

I went to an easier, no screw-up route for a 2 week vacation. I made sure adult children and parents had whatsapp set up and used that for voice calling on both the Airala data or wifi when I had it. I turned the Verizon esim off when I was in the plane leaving the U.S. and didn't turn it back on until I was back in the U.S. . In Peru, and many Latin American countries, whatsapp is commonly used for voice calls locally. For people without whatsapp, I used email.

When I got back home, I deleted the Airalo esim.

 

[HarveyS]

I have been using the Ubigi eSim since late February. First in the Netherlands with an EU monthly plan. Then in Switzerland with an EU 27 plus Swiss plan. Then in France with the EU plan. Since you are in the UK you need to get a plan that covers the UK. It's easy to understand on the Ubigi website or app.
I buy the plan monthly based on what my need for the upcoming month will be.
Super affordable, easy to use. If you don't need a plan for some time, just let the current plan expire and buy a plan the next time you need it.
I watched a few YouTube videos to get the eSim turned on.
In August I returned to the USA and the physical Tracfone sim worked just fine.
Now in South Africa and Ubigi working fine here as well.

iPhone 11.