Apple unveiled the iPhone 14 series of phones and many other products at its fall event on 9/7, including the next-generation AirPods, Apple Watch Series 8, Apple Watch SE, and Apple Watch Ultra. More important than many new products, however, is Apple’s decision to boldly remove the SIM card slot on phones sold in the United States.
Apple removes the SIM card slot on the iPhone, is this trend good or bad?
As we all know, Apple is brave to innovate, but at the same time it often challenges the habits of consumers. This time Apple decided to let go of the SIM card slot of the US version of the iPhone 14 series, hoping that users will switch to eSIM. Although this is a big change , but it is not considered entirely a good thing for users.
Support is not very popular yet
In theory, an eSIM is a digital solution to replacing a physical SIM card, allowing telcos to share connection details on your smartphone, preventing the SIM card from being lost, damaged or stolen, and ideally Change cellular providers quickly and easily. The problem is that each telco has its own threshold, not to mention that there are actually a lot of telcos in the US that don’t actually support eSIM.
Like seriously. Go look at the list of all the MVNOs in the US and then compare it to Apple’s list of supported eSIM carriers. It’s not perfect, since Apple is missing a few, but a *lot* of carriers don’t support eSIM.https://t.co/byFxayccoihttps://t.co/EipQs3Dgj3
— Zachary Wander ???????? (@Wander1236) September 7, 2022
Let’s take the United States, which tested the water temperature first, as an example. If U.S. users want to use the telecommunications services currently in use on the latest iPhone 14 series, they must first check to see if the service provider supports eSIM, otherwise they must push the telecommunications provider to introduce support for eSIM, but more It is possible that users have to change telecom service providers in order to change mobile phones, and some telecom providers only provide eSIM services for higher-end users. If you accidentally break your phone, using pure eSIM is also a bit of a hassle, because you can’t immediately take out the SIM card and put it on the old phone, following all, your old phone probably doesn’t support eSIM, and you need to Wait for your carrier to issue a new eSIM to you.
International roaming will be the biggest pain point of pure eSIM
Although Taiwan’s telecommunications companies will provide international roaming services, as long as the user activates it, people who travel abroad are more inclined to buy a local SIM card or roaming card to use to save the higher roaming charges for the original number. Are there local eSIM options in many countries around the world? Absolutely! Apple also does thismade a listFor your reference, but it does not mean that everyone will choose it without hesitation. For example, Vodafone is the only telco in Ireland that supports eSIM, but at the same time their telecommunications service fee is much higher than other local telcos. If you buy a physical SIM card from other local telcos, you only need to spend 10 euros To get 30 days of internet all-you-can-eat, you need to spend at least 20 euros when you buy Vodafone’s eSIM.
▲ Image source: MacRumors
Although eSIM can be replaced without buying a physical SIM card when you change telecommunications providers, on the other hand, for those who are only going abroad for a short-term vacation, it is specially for these few days to apply and jump to another local telecommunications provider The formalities required for the service are not worth it.
Change takes courage, so does choice
In fact, looking at it this way, it seems that the decision of pure eSIM basically does not help consumers much. Every decision Apple makes to challenge consumer habits is often motivated and self-righteous. For example, removing the headphone jack has been touted as a way to increase the available space inside the phone for other components, and Apple has also been “thoughtful” in introducing AirPods for everyone to buy. Removing the included charging transformer is known as an environmental improvement, but consumers still end up paying more for a separate transformer.
Even more paradoxically, the iPhone 14 series that Apple is now producing is equal to 3 different independent variants, the eSIM-only version in the United States, the eSIM + physical card slot version in most parts of the world, and the dual version in China. Physical card slot version. Because the iPhone’s extensive support for 5G and other network bands makes it the best phone for roaming in everyone’s minds, removing the physical card slot now will hit American users who often need to travel abroad in the first place. Even if eSIM is a trend, it is not a mainstream trend so far. Although it has been several years since its birth, it has not been widely adopted in the world, so it seems that it will take a long time to become more widely popularized.
For users outside the US, although it won’t make a difference in this generation, we can only hope that consumers will not respond to this well, and then Apple will decide to stop in the US in the next generation or simply abandon this strategy, Otherwise, according to Apple’s tradition of going its own way, it is very likely that this strategy will be gradually extended to the world in the next step. But judging from Apple’s influence in the past, this is likely to send a signal to Android manufacturers that other Android brands may first laugh at it, and then quickly find a way to follow up. In the end, it is consumers who will be affected.
