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I got bit by this when I bought a new iPhone recently, apparently the carrier "didn't allow" eSIM transfer so I had to go get another eSIM on my carrier's websi

I got bit by this when I bought a new iPhone recently, apparently the carrier "didn't allow" eSIM transfer so I had to go get another eSIM on my carrier's website. How does Android protect against this? The carrier somehow disallowing it?

lakpan 3y ago
From the article: > Although carrier support is still limited, Nope. eSIM is crap on android too.
- ThePowerOfFuet 3y ago
  Works great for me. Sounds like your carrier is what's crap.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
izacus 3y ago
It does not. eSIM isn't made to help you, it's made to give control back to carrier and them money.
- hef19898 3y ago
  How is an eSIM any different from a normal one? I can get up to three eSIM (if memory serves well, did not check) from my carrier for free, plus up to two normal SIMs for free. And the carrier controls all of those anyway. And additional SIMs are below 10 bucks. A more general remarque so, I get it that sometimes companies monetize a tad too much. But then nobody is working for free, no service comes without cost for the provider and we all have to make money to pay our bills. Hence I do not get the "they are doing it onpy for money" attitude, especially on a site like HN with a considerable number of people making litteral FAANG money, money that comes exactly from these practices.
  - mitthrowaway2 3y ago
    > considerable number of people making litteral FAANG money As always, be careful not to confuse the sample with the distribution. The commenter you are replying to is not necessarily one of those people. Also, their statement might be matter-of-fact, not a condemnation.
  - pi-e-sigma 3y ago
    Transferring eSIMs between the carriers requires their cooperation. They have to 'approve' the transfer and can drag their feet, create artificial obstacles along the way or simply refuse the transfer. Meanwhile moving traditional SIMs between phones just works
    - eertami 3y ago
      Don't many phone providers sell locked/branded phones that can only be used with their physical sims? This locking down has always existed, long before smartphones, and it's the reason I only buy phones direct from manufacturers.
  - TeMPOraL 3y ago
    > Hence I do not get the "they are doing it onpy for money" attitude, especially on a site like HN I didn't read it as "they're doing it only for money". That indeed is perfectly understandable. I read GP as saying, they're being customer-abusive asshats. We all need to make money to pay our bills and such, however there's a subtle but important difference between selling some good/service/labor in exchange for money, and abusing the customer to extract money from them. eSIM, per GP, is designed very much for the latter case.
  - izacus 3y ago
    > Hence I do not get the "they are doing it onpy for money" attitude, especially on a site like HN with a considerable number of people making litteral FAANG money, money that comes exactly from these practices. As someone who designed quite a few public systems like this, I can recognize one that's built with users in mind and one that's built with profiteering in mind. There's no reason for eSIM to not be easily transferrable between devices like pSIMs are. There's no reason that the QR codes with provisioning tokens can't be reusable and revokable like pSIM ones. There's no reason that eSIM provisioning servers work on whitelist principle where they deny all phones the carrier doesn't profit from. And yet now we have all that. And before (at least here in Europe, I'm aware that US citizens are very used and defensive about abusive business practices by their telecoms) we didn't.
- yokoprime 3y ago
  I've never had any additional costs incurred due to eSIM. It's always been free and instant, where as physical SIM cards I at times have had to pay a fee to swap out and it's always been a multi day process
  - izacus 3y ago
    Well, I did. Among others, the one of my carriers demanded (still does!) physical presence in their store to transfer eSIM which is a significant cost to anyone when their phone breaks. This was not the case with a small plastic card. I've also had actual costs being charged when eSIM provisioning failed with "error -2" or whatever during travel and then carrier support refused to do anything about it (after taking my money for the card of course).
    - vel0city 3y ago
      One carrier of mine demanded I appear in a physical store to issue a new physical SIM so it's not like eSIMs created or enabled that policy.
      - izacus 3y ago
        For my experience eSIM absolutely created that policy. The same carriers pSIMs still don't require that, so I'm not sure what exactly are you arguing here? The fact that your carrier has a shitty policy it's now ok to spread it?
        vel0city 3y ago
        I'm arguing shitty carriers can make shitty policies regardless of the underlying technology. It's not like eSIMs forced them to do that policy, the carrier just decided to be shitty all on their own. eSIMs can be delivered entirely digitally, so in reality they should be even easier and have even fewer needs to ever be in person. eSIM didn't make that policy, your carrier did.
      - alwa 3y ago
- yaantc 3y ago
  The opposite: eSIM allows IoT devices being moved from one operator to another remotely, with no physical SIM swap. With device using physical SIM this wouldn't be economical, with eSIM remote change it can be. This allows long term users (meters, industrial connectivity, ...) not to be tied to a single MNO. They can regularly renegotiate their contract, and use competition. And the telcos really hate this, and tried to delay this happening as much as they could. Still in the end users and device makers managed to push this through the telcos throat.
  - Kwpolska 3y ago
    The eSIM standard for embedded/internet-of-shit use is vastly different to the eSIM standard for phones and consumers. The devices could have their own standard, but as a consumer, I prefer my small metal and plastic square, thankyouverymuch.
- 999900000999 3y ago
  I've had carriers block physical sim swaps. Some even charge for it.
- ratg13 3y ago
  esim allows me to provision my phone with a new phone number wherever I am. I don't even need to go to any location, I just need someone to send me a QR code. It is extremely helpful and a huge time saver.
harha 3y ago
Incredibly annoying - advertised "better than SIM", but really just a massive inconvenience. The only good use-case (for the user) is buying travel eSIMs.
- pzmarzly 3y ago
  Another good use-case for eSIMs, at least in EU where carriers have to transfer your number within 24 hours, is moving number between carriers. Before, this involved waiting for new SIM arriving by snail mail, or having to drive to carrier's shop to pick it up, sometimes while your number was already deactivated at old carrier. With eSIM it recently took me less than 1 hour from requesting a number transfer to using it with new carrier, all without leaving house. But it all depends on the carrier now - I heard stories of carriers who won't send you the QR code, instead requiring you to drive to their store so they can show it to you in person "for security", defeating the whole purpose.
  - usr1106 3y ago
    I don't think such EU regulation exists. I transferred my number from one operator to a competitor recently. There was a one week (I believe) warning period that the transfer was announced, but could still have been cancelled. The old operator used the week to make me 3 increasing discount offers. Had I switched just for economic reasons I could have cancelled the operation on Saturday just before the scheduled transfer at Monday noon and saved a bit of money.
    - OJFord 3y ago
      It exists for sure in the UK (you should complain to Ofcom as regulator in your case) - I would assume it's the same in the EU because it's not new, and the kind of thing we shared.
      - Kwpolska 3y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_number_portability#Europe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_number_portability#Euro... suggests it’s not necessarily 24 hours.
raverbashing 3y ago
I think you can still keep the original qr code and use that no?
- redrove 3y ago
  They expire, at least mine did.
- asdaq1312512 3y ago
  Only a few carriers use non-expiring QR codes.
zaptheimpaler 3y ago
Can you clarify, was it free and relatively easy to get a new eSIM on the website?
- masklinn 3y ago
  I also hit the issue, it was trivial to get a new esim from the provider but not being able to transfer was unexpected and annoying (as I had to emergency go and hunt for a way to renew). It added frustration to the phone change, especially as esim transfer is straight up part of apple's migration assistant so I can only assume when it works it's seamless.
  - redrove 3y ago
    Basically the same experience for me as well.

lakpan 3y ago

From the article: > Although carrier support is still limited, Nope. eSIM is crap on android too.

ThePowerOfFuet 3y ago
Works great for me. Sounds like your carrier is what's crap.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

izacus 3y ago

It does not. eSIM isn't made to help you, it's made to give control back to carrier and them money.

hef19898 3y ago
How is an eSIM any different from a normal one? I can get up to three eSIM (if memory serves well, did not check) from my carrier for free, plus up to two normal SIMs for free. And the carrier controls all of those anyway. And additional SIMs are below 10 bucks. A more general remarque so, I get it that sometimes companies monetize a tad too much. But then nobody is working for free, no service comes without cost for the provider and we all have to make money to pay our bills. Hence I do not get the "they are doing it onpy for money" attitude, especially on a site like HN with a considerable number of people making litteral FAANG money, money that comes exactly from these practices.
- mitthrowaway2 3y ago
  > considerable number of people making litteral FAANG money As always, be careful not to confuse the sample with the distribution. The commenter you are replying to is not necessarily one of those people. Also, their statement might be matter-of-fact, not a condemnation.
- pi-e-sigma 3y ago
  Transferring eSIMs between the carriers requires their cooperation. They have to 'approve' the transfer and can drag their feet, create artificial obstacles along the way or simply refuse the transfer. Meanwhile moving traditional SIMs between phones just works
  - eertami 3y ago
    Don't many phone providers sell locked/branded phones that can only be used with their physical sims? This locking down has always existed, long before smartphones, and it's the reason I only buy phones direct from manufacturers.
- TeMPOraL 3y ago
  > Hence I do not get the "they are doing it onpy for money" attitude, especially on a site like HN I didn't read it as "they're doing it only for money". That indeed is perfectly understandable. I read GP as saying, they're being customer-abusive asshats. We all need to make money to pay our bills and such, however there's a subtle but important difference between selling some good/service/labor in exchange for money, and abusing the customer to extract money from them. eSIM, per GP, is designed very much for the latter case.
- izacus 3y ago
  > Hence I do not get the "they are doing it onpy for money" attitude, especially on a site like HN with a considerable number of people making litteral FAANG money, money that comes exactly from these practices. As someone who designed quite a few public systems like this, I can recognize one that's built with users in mind and one that's built with profiteering in mind. There's no reason for eSIM to not be easily transferrable between devices like pSIMs are. There's no reason that the QR codes with provisioning tokens can't be reusable and revokable like pSIM ones. There's no reason that eSIM provisioning servers work on whitelist principle where they deny all phones the carrier doesn't profit from. And yet now we have all that. And before (at least here in Europe, I'm aware that US citizens are very used and defensive about abusive business practices by their telecoms) we didn't.
yokoprime 3y ago
I've never had any additional costs incurred due to eSIM. It's always been free and instant, where as physical SIM cards I at times have had to pay a fee to swap out and it's always been a multi day process
- izacus 3y ago
  Well, I did. Among others, the one of my carriers demanded (still does!) physical presence in their store to transfer eSIM which is a significant cost to anyone when their phone breaks. This was not the case with a small plastic card. I've also had actual costs being charged when eSIM provisioning failed with "error -2" or whatever during travel and then carrier support refused to do anything about it (after taking my money for the card of course).
  - vel0city 3y ago
    One carrier of mine demanded I appear in a physical store to issue a new physical SIM so it's not like eSIMs created or enabled that policy.
    - izacus 3y ago
      For my experience eSIM absolutely created that policy. The same carriers pSIMs still don't require that, so I'm not sure what exactly are you arguing here? The fact that your carrier has a shitty policy it's now ok to spread it?
      - vel0city 3y ago
        I'm arguing shitty carriers can make shitty policies regardless of the underlying technology. It's not like eSIMs forced them to do that policy, the carrier just decided to be shitty all on their own. eSIMs can be delivered entirely digitally, so in reality they should be even easier and have even fewer needs to ever be in person. eSIM didn't make that policy, your carrier did.
    - alwa 3y ago
yaantc 3y ago
The opposite: eSIM allows IoT devices being moved from one operator to another remotely, with no physical SIM swap. With device using physical SIM this wouldn't be economical, with eSIM remote change it can be. This allows long term users (meters, industrial connectivity, ...) not to be tied to a single MNO. They can regularly renegotiate their contract, and use competition. And the telcos really hate this, and tried to delay this happening as much as they could. Still in the end users and device makers managed to push this through the telcos throat.
- Kwpolska 3y ago
  The eSIM standard for embedded/internet-of-shit use is vastly different to the eSIM standard for phones and consumers. The devices could have their own standard, but as a consumer, I prefer my small metal and plastic square, thankyouverymuch.
999900000999 3y ago
I've had carriers block physical sim swaps. Some even charge for it.
ratg13 3y ago
esim allows me to provision my phone with a new phone number wherever I am. I don't even need to go to any location, I just need someone to send me a QR code. It is extremely helpful and a huge time saver.

harha 3y ago

Incredibly annoying - advertised "better than SIM", but really just a massive inconvenience. The only good use-case (for the user) is buying travel eSIMs.

pzmarzly 3y ago
Another good use-case for eSIMs, at least in EU where carriers have to transfer your number within 24 hours, is moving number between carriers. Before, this involved waiting for new SIM arriving by snail mail, or having to drive to carrier's shop to pick it up, sometimes while your number was already deactivated at old carrier. With eSIM it recently took me less than 1 hour from requesting a number transfer to using it with new carrier, all without leaving house. But it all depends on the carrier now - I heard stories of carriers who won't send you the QR code, instead requiring you to drive to their store so they can show it to you in person "for security", defeating the whole purpose.
- usr1106 3y ago
  I don't think such EU regulation exists. I transferred my number from one operator to a competitor recently. There was a one week (I believe) warning period that the transfer was announced, but could still have been cancelled. The old operator used the week to make me 3 increasing discount offers. Had I switched just for economic reasons I could have cancelled the operation on Saturday just before the scheduled transfer at Monday noon and saved a bit of money.
  - OJFord 3y ago
    It exists for sure in the UK (you should complain to Ofcom as regulator in your case) - I would assume it's the same in the EU because it's not new, and the kind of thing we shared.
    - Kwpolska 3y ago
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_number_portability#Europe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_number_portability#Euro... suggests it’s not necessarily 24 hours.

raverbashing 3y ago

I think you can still keep the original qr code and use that no?

redrove 3y ago
They expire, at least mine did.
asdaq1312512 3y ago
Only a few carriers use non-expiring QR codes.

zaptheimpaler 3y ago

Can you clarify, was it free and relatively easy to get a new eSIM on the website?

masklinn 3y ago
I also hit the issue, it was trivial to get a new esim from the provider but not being able to transfer was unexpected and annoying (as I had to emergency go and hunt for a way to renew). It added frustration to the phone change, especially as esim transfer is straight up part of apple's migration assistant so I can only assume when it works it's seamless.
- redrove 3y ago
  Basically the same experience for me as well.