Five Years Later, Is eSIM Finally Ready To Take On the World? (androidauthority.com) 89
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Android Authority: It's been five years since the advent of the eSIM card on smartphones, and yet the computer in our pockets is still tied down to a plastic tab that hasn't changed all that much since its debut in 1991. What gives? [...] An eSIM-enabled phone can store multiple SIM cards on the device. It makes switching networks as simple as switching your Wi-Fi network, and that's anything but convenient for mobile operators. For users in areas with spotty connectivity or rural networks, easier switching to alternative operators means loss of business for major players like Verizon or AT&T. In markets like India, dual-wielding SIM cards for better data, voice, or preferential rates are exceptionally common. Taking away the friction involved in changing physical SIM cards carries the risk of losing a customer, and it's no secret that operators have been dragging their feet to avoid that.
Theoretically, setting up an eSIM on any network should be as straightforward as pointing your camera at a QR code and activating a line. In practice, that's rarely true. Verizon's support page suggests that Android users need to call up a support desk to activate an eSIM. iPhone users have it slightly easier and can directly add the line to the phone through Verizon's website. Meanwhile, Vodafone requires you to install an app. Finally, the likes of Airtel India ask you to play a game of the fastest finger first by requiring an SMS response within 60 seconds to proceed with adding an eSIM to your line. None of these are as simple as just popping out a tray and plopping in your SIM card.
Meanwhile, as internet-based calling, texting, and video messaging become the norm, carriers are left with increasingly few add-ons to increase revenues. Tack on sky-high spectrum prices for resources like 5G and eSIMs become even less enticing to carriers. Tangential features like premium-priced international roaming plans are yet another profit driver that eSIMs circumvent. When done right, getting started with an international eSIM can be a simple two to three-click process to get you onboarded and ongoing. My colleague Rita and I have had a fantastic experience with travel eSIM services like Airalo. When I tried out Airalo earlier this year, the process took just a few taps indicating that there was no real reason for eSIMs to be complicated. However, for most operators, that just isn't the case. While hard to quantify, this needless friction has certainly hampered consumer perception of eSIMs.
Theoretically, setting up an eSIM on any network should be as straightforward as pointing your camera at a QR code and activating a line. In practice, that's rarely true. Verizon's support page suggests that Android users need to call up a support desk to activate an eSIM. iPhone users have it slightly easier and can directly add the line to the phone through Verizon's website. Meanwhile, Vodafone requires you to install an app. Finally, the likes of Airtel India ask you to play a game of the fastest finger first by requiring an SMS response within 60 seconds to proceed with adding an eSIM to your line. None of these are as simple as just popping out a tray and plopping in your SIM card.
Meanwhile, as internet-based calling, texting, and video messaging become the norm, carriers are left with increasingly few add-ons to increase revenues. Tack on sky-high spectrum prices for resources like 5G and eSIMs become even less enticing to carriers. Tangential features like premium-priced international roaming plans are yet another profit driver that eSIMs circumvent. When done right, getting started with an international eSIM can be a simple two to three-click process to get you onboarded and ongoing. My colleague Rita and I have had a fantastic experience with travel eSIM services like Airalo. When I tried out Airalo earlier this year, the process took just a few taps indicating that there was no real reason for eSIMs to be complicated. However, for most operators, that just isn't the case. While hard to quantify, this needless friction has certainly hampered consumer perception of eSIMs.
Some carriers are just lame AF (Score:2, Insightful)
Six, half a dozen. In order for you to do that, someone has to design the tray, it has to be manufactured, etc etc. The complexity just moves. If your carrier sucks they're gonna always suck.
Re: (Score:3)
Six, half a dozen. In order for you to do that, someone has to design the tray, it has to be manufactured, etc etc. The complexity just moves. If your carrier sucks they're gonna always suck.
I think it comes down to user friendliness, that's the reason e-SIMs haven't taken off. It's just too user unfriendly at the moment. Much simpler to pop in a SIM and have done with, even with faffing about finding a pin to open the SIM slot, it's still under a minute to swap SIMs.
If things are too difficult for users to do, users wont do them.
Even though I'd dread to go back to a single SIM phone, I think the use cases for multiple SIMs are minimal at best. My entire use case is international travel.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Some carriers are just lame AF (Score:4, Interesting)
My use case is that I have a SIM card that I occasionally want to use with a tablet, and use with a phone the rest of the time. I can do the SIM swap anywhere, even if I don't have access to a cell signal on either device at that moment. It stands to reason that I can't have both devices active with an eSim, so it seems like this would involve some jumping through hoops. I also like that I don't have to tell my carrier what device I'm using (they didn't seem to notice that I've upgraded my phone twice since I started service, at least according to my account info when I log in to the web site.)
With an eSim, it would seem that I would need to involve the carrier whenever I make the swap, and they would be incentivized to prevent this use case. (I'm sure they'd rather that I paid for an additional line.)
So the question to folks in the know is, can we 'swap' eSims without having the carrier involved?
Re: Some carriers are just lame AF (Score:2)
If your phone has an eSim and no connectivity it is harder and more time-consuming to find and fix the problem than if your phone has a Sim and no connectivity.
Re: (Score:2)
The "eSIM" as a dual-sim is a fine alternative if it's a prepaid type of service.
An "eSIM" as the only SIM is vendor-lockin, and should be avoided.
Nobody really needs "dual SIM" except if they travel between areas that are mutually hostile to each other. Like China and Hongkong or Taiwan. This is why dual-SIM's are popular there. You can't have a carrier from mainland China and use it outside mainland china with any ease. eSIM at least takes away the complexity of having a second phone number/data line when
Re: (Score:2)
From my perspective it's not the ability to switch between SIMs in my phone that's the point, I want to be able to switch between different devices. Sometimes I do test some new devices and then it's convenient to swap in the SIM card there.
An eSIM will be a lot more complicated, especially if there are legacy devices around.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
There are at least three advantages of eSIM:
1. They can be bought and delivered online.
2. They don't need a slot. So, the phone can be $1 cheaper and 2g lighter.
3. They can be easier to restore if lost. And they can be much easier to restore if lost abroad.
Verizon is being intentionally obtuse (Score:5, Insightful)
We use e-SIMs when travelling. They are great and easy way to enable mobile service in coutnries where you don't have roaming coverage quickly and easily. And yes it's as easy as pointing the camera to a QR code. ... or since the camera is normally on the device receiving the confirmation email it's as easy as taking a screenshot of the QR code and then selecting that screenshot file when prompted by Android.
I'm playing the world's smallest violin for carriers after years of making things as complicated as possible, sitting on subsidies without improving their networks in the ways intended, locking up spectrum anticompetitively, and charging insanely unreasonable fees for no reason*.
* I once got a 200EUR phone bill because I was on the phone in Monaco. The phonecall started on the TGV while I was still in France proper, but technically Monaco is not a member nation of the EU so Vodaphone decided to start charging roaming fees when I stepped on that 200 hectare bit of land within France. Just lucky the company paid.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Where I travel, there is no esim support, so I still need a SIM card.
Most phones if they do support esim only support two, which should be enough for anyone, I suppose.
Re: (Score:2)
Where I travel, there is no esim support
eSIM is not supported by a location or a destination, it's supported by a provider. Where I travel I don't buy eSIMs from local providers. There are many companies that offer roaming services to various countries at discount rate which are only available via eSIM. They typically have agreements with large local providers. You may want to look into such a provider, ... they often have questionable sounding names, but so far I've not be burnt yet.
Re: (Score:1)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
All my phones have SIM and uSD card slots. But with that said, on a phone without the latter, the former only raises costs and adds failure modes, and provides little benefit to most users (who have carrier-locked phones, and will never swap SIMs.)
I won't buy such devices, but they do provide an actual benefit. I have phones with SIM connectivity problems. Cleaning solved them, but it's a hassle. And if you're out in the world when it happens, it's an extra hassle.
SIM tray (Score:3)
There is absolutely nothing at all wrong with SIM cards. Nothing. Need to support multiple carriers? Outside of the US, it is common (and in some parts of the world standard) for phones to have multiple SIM card trays. eSIMs didn't fix that.
BUT! Even outisde of the US:
Nearly always, this only go up to 2 SIMs on the tray. (Personal experience: none of my phone ever had more).
And very often the second slot is shared with the SD card -- so you need to sacrifice storage it if you want to have a second card (Personal experience: 2 out of my last 3 dual-SIM phone had shared tray).
That means that at best you could have fast switch-over only between 2 providers. (Anything else requires swapping card on the tray. And trying hard not to lose the spare c
Re: (Score:2)
What's the likelihood you'll need more than 2 at a time? You have your home country SIM in one slot and the country-you're-in-now SIM in the other. Unless you're someplace like Europe where you can cross multiple countries in a day's drive, this isn't likely to be a big limitation.
(FWIW, T-Mobile (in the US, at least) provides free international roaming in most of the wo
Scenario (Score:2)
What's the likelihood you'll need more than 2 at a time? You have your home country SIM in one slot and the country-you're-in-now SIM in the other.
I literally mentioned that this is the only scenario where 2 SIMs are enough:
Unless you're someplace like Europe where you can cross multiple countries in a day's drive,
I litteraly do.
I can bike to two other c
Re: (Score:2)
Does any phone actually allow more than two eSIMs? As far as I know, they either support one physical SIM card and one eSIM, or two eSIMs. I haven't heard of any that support larger numbers.
multiple eSIM (Score:2)
There are no technical reasons to limit the number of eSIM as long as only max two are used at the same time.
i.e.: each of your dual-SIM modem's IMEI can only be logged with one SIM at a time / use one phone number at a time.
It's the virtual equivalent of having a dual SIM tray and a large bag with lots of SIMs to pick 2 from.
A quick googling reveals that Apple support [apple.com] "8 or more eSIM" but only "two numbers at the same time".
And apparently Android 13 should be supporting it [xda-developers.com] too, even on phone which didn't
Re:Yeah, this: (Score:4, Interesting)
We came out of the CDMA/TDMA dark ages, where we had to beg/wheedle/whine to a carrier, and most would not allow a phone on their networks unless they sold it, citing "it is too dangerous and untested with our testing". GSM bypassed that, and allowed easy movement between carriers, just by dropping their SIM into the socket and going from there, provided the phone supported the correct bands.
SIMs also provided functionality that wasn't on the phone, such as SoftCard, which even though it was a dead venture, it showed that authentication for transactions could be done outside the phone, on a SIM app, ensuring that there is some security, even if the phone is compromised.
With eSIMs, we are back to that. Now we have to beg a new provider to allow our device on their network... and they don't have to. They can easily give you the middle finger, especially if the phone isn't something they sell. They don't even have to have an app to swap to the new device... you may wind up having to call some customer service number and wait hours on the phone just to do what a SIM swap could do in seconds. $DEITY help you if you decide to go to another country for a day trip and just swap a card out for that day.
eSIMs don't provide any benefits for the end user. It is like going back into a dark age. Ironically, it is only the US that Apple is forcing eSIMs on. Every other country in the world gets an iPhone with a SIM tray.
Re: (Score:2)
In my country it's actually worse than CDMA. In the CDMA days when you got a new phone you could pop onto the provider's website and enter a few details to swap your number onto the new phone. With eSIM the same provider requires that you take both the old and new phones into one of their retail locations, where they do the swap for you. There is no self-service way of doing it.
I saw a comment from someone who bought a new phone while overseas and had to contact the helpdesk. "How do I swap my prepaid eSIM
Re: (Score:2)
With eSIMs, we are back to that. Now we have to beg a new provider to allow our device on their network... and they don't have to.
No we don't. An eSIM is literally no different than a normal SIM in functionality. A provider offers you a service or they don't. There is no change here and no begging to be done. The process for activating an eSIM is completely phone agnostic. If you have an eSIM it will be compatible with every provider offering eSIMs, and the provider doesn't get a say in what phone it is.
Re: Yeah, this: (Score:2)
So when I upgrade my iPhone 8 to a 14 or 15, itâ(TM)ll be easy? And then when I want to use my 8 (or my 6s) as my gig phone for an evening (can stomach it being lost, broken or stolen in the mosh pit), thatâ(TM)s easy too is it? Ah no, that wonâ(TM)t work: even if those older phones had eSIM support, sounds like transferring back and forth is more hassle than with physical SIMs. There are tons of other scenarios where swapping back and forth conveniently between devices is required, so I
Re: (Score:3)
I agree partially. I got an iPhone 14 Pro, wasn't exactly thrilled with it, so wanted to test my Android again for a bit. I had to go back into a store! I couldn't even switch my phone online.
From a pure technology standpoint, if the flexibility of SIM can be done in software instead of via chip, then great. In practice, eSim should not be the norm until it achieves the simplicity of physical SIM. And, I think that's your point: "They" don't see that as an objective.
Re: (Score:1)
And all of this is by design because the eSIM isn't about freeing the user, it's about changing the user's master. This bureaucracy is what Apple wanted, it effectively makes it torturous to change devices.
LOL. Apple was specifically against the eSIM (a GSMA standard) and didn't get the first product out the door. Additionally, when they did release an iPhone with support, other vendors phones were released in the same quarter (showing a large portion of the industry was working on it).
There is absolutely nothing at all wrong with SIM cards.
Except they are small, can be easily lost, are not designed to be removable, and it's a frigging nightmare to play around with them when travelling.
Outside of the US, it is common (and in some parts of the world standard) for phones to have multiple SIM card trays.
It is, and they are even more of a pain in the arse, especially the back to bac
Re: (Score:1)
Re: Yeah, this: (Score:3)
They are designed to be removable. The first GSM phone that I owned used a credit card-sized SIM card that could be easily hot-swapped (it had a slider on its side to pull the card out). Also, the card was meant to hold your "personal profile" (phone numbers and messages), so that you could switch easily from a phone to another one bringing your information along.
It's phone designers who reduced the card size again and again and m
Re: (Score:2)
They are designed to be removable. The first GSM phone that I owned used a credit card-sized SIM card that could be easily hot-swapped
I don't know in what world disagreeing with me by pointing to something that literally hasn't been on the market for decades is any kind of a sane point to make. You even point out at the end that you now need a dedicated tool to remove the damn thing.
That's temporal whataboutism.
Re: Yeah, this: (Score:2)
While I'm at it, I add another bit of funny info: Motorola were designing a GSM phone with TWO full sized ISO card slots, in the second of which supposedly you'd put your credit card (no idea what for). Smart cards wer
Re: (Score:2)
It appears that Apple makes it easy to transfer an eSIM to a new device: https://support.apple.com/en-g... [apple.com].
The issue is the carriers. They obviously don't want you to be able to make duplicates of an eSIM and use the same one in multiple phones, and they don't trust the phone manufacturers to prevent it happening.
Re: Yeah, this: (Score:2)
They also donâ(TM)t want me to get your eSim serial (or equivalent) and let me steal your line.
Re: (Score:2)
Apple is connecting into the carrier's HLR for provisioning new SIM cards and deactivating old ones. They've got control over your account.
It's a lot of effort for the carriers to be able to support this, either software upgrades or needing to implement and API of some description between their HLR / Billing and Apple.
The carriers want this to happen in some ways because it stops them from phoning the customer care line / going into a shop which costs them money, but there's still a definite cost to impleme
I beg to differ (Score:1)
There is absolutely nothing at all wrong with SIM cards.
I have some friends that live in Europe, one time he had just come from some other country and opened up his wallet to change out his sim... a wallet with something like 20 SIM cards in it!
This is madness. They are small, easy to lose and break. It is WAY nicer to have these things be virtual.
After the latest iPhone launch I went and looked, and there is apparently a website now where you can easily go and grab an eSim for any country you like, so y
Data ... (Score:2)
Give me a data connection, why do I want this Phone and Text system ....
Why do I need a SIM or and eSIM for a data connection, I don't need one for any other data connection?
Re:Data ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Your SIM card has a certificate on it, that certificate is used to authenticate you to the network and for the network to verify you.
Your SIM card is part of the handshake protocols as as for encrypting the traffic between you and the cell / core (Depending on which generation mobile you're talking about)
eSIM moves that authentication / encryption from the SIM card (Running Java card no less, with a million and one security holes) to the device.
Are we moving backwards? (Score:4, Informative)
Re: Are we moving backwards? (Score:2)
This may actually increase e-waste too. Need a different carrier? Red tape of contacting a carrier and switching or putting an esim activation onto a different handset. What's the alternative? Burner phones!
Re: (Score:3)
Carriers can and do put in device bans on their network.
eSIM vs SIM has no difference from the perspective of the network on the carrier side. You can have multiple SIMs in some devices and multiple eSIMs on others.
The place where it makes a big difference is in provisioning, you need a bunch of additional infrastructure for the provisioning of and secure delivery of eSIMs to customers.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
SIMs freed you up to swap phones and carriers at will as long as they were unlocked. Now we're back to no SIM where we need a carrier's full permission to put a phone on their system.
Nope. The carriers don't have control over your phone. eSIM and SIM are practically identical in how they work. If your phone supports eSIM and your carrier offers you eSIMs they get no say about the model or origin of your phone. And carrier locking still works like it always did.
The only difference is eSIMs are OTA provisioned rather than a pre-programmed card sent out to you.
Re: (Score:2)
Indeed. That is why I have no eSIM. I do have a very cheap data provider on one device ($5/Month) for slow data-only and they do not charge anything for a physical SIM and I can terminate the contract at any time. Hence issuing a physical SIM cannot actually be that expensive.
apple needs to suck it up and say NO esim locking (Score:2)
apple needs to suck it up and say NO esim locking
So much for easy phone swaps (Score:5, Insightful)
It's really convenient to be able to move your number/service to a different physical phone if the one you're using breaks, or you need to use a different one temporarily for some reason, or even if you just get a new phone. With the eSIM, you have to go hat in hand to the carrier to switch devices. And you're just fucked if the whole reason you're switching is that you don't have any working communications.
Not an improvement.
Re: (Score:3)
Actually, for me eSIM is a lot easier. If I lose my SIM, I can get a new QR code off the web site / app and be up and running in under an hour without having to visit a shop.
I don't regularly move my SIM between devices, so its really not that big a deal for me.
Re: So much for easy phone swaps (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Or someone nearby who's got signal who I can hotspot off for 20 seconds. It's very rare that I've lost my phone / sim and need to swap to another phone.
A lot of providers will allow you to add a second device to your plan with eSIM. This is usually for smart watches, but technically you can add another phone.
Re: (Score:2)
It's really convenient to be able to move your number/service to a different physical phone if the one you're using breaks, or you need to use a different one temporarily for some reason, or even if you just get a new phone. With the eSIM, you have to go hat in hand to the carrier to switch devices. And you're just fucked if the whole reason you're switching is that you don't have any working communications.
Not an improvement.
Conversely it's really easy to swap SIM cards if you go to another country where roaming charges are crazy. I.E. most of the world for most people. A lot of airports have vending machine selling SIM cards these days (not to mention buying them online). If it's hard to get a physical SIM at your destination, the same issues will prevent the sale of eSIMs (usually nations that have strict ID requirements, if you need to physically front up with a passport or national ID to get a SIM, doesn't matter if it's ph
Advertorial (Score:1)
Based on experience, I'm going to go with 'No' (Score:2)
Someone should do a count of what proportion of Slashdot Headlines-as-Questions have been answered 'Yes' since they were asked.
Re: (Score:2)
Are there any?
Re: (Score:2)
GigSky (Score:2)
I am playing around with GigSky's mobile data-only service. It utilizes an eSIM, and is part of a pilot test of the Helium network's 5G service. I have a small indoor cell, and the purchase came bundled with a few month's free trial service. It is handy, and configuring things wasn't terribly difficult. Seems a little more modern than using the old school SIM card, which had a secondary use back in the day for storing all of your phone contacts.
Re: (Score:2)
They stay in business with the airlines.
Next question?
eSIM Limitations (Score:4, Insightful)
Two core issues hold eSIM adoption back
- Many new phones in the US purposefully ship with eSIM disabled, only to be enabled with a software update after 12 months.
- Transferring an eSIM from one phone to another is ridiculously difficult to borderline impossible - neither iOS nor Android allow you to do this cleanly. Meanwhile a hardware SIM I can move in seconds.
Re: (Score:2)
Transferring an eSIM from one phone to another is ridiculously difficult to borderline impossible
Deactivate the old, sign up the new. There's no "transfer" required. Just remove the old eSIM and get a new barcode from your provider (note something they do without question anyway since eSIMs get wiped by factory resets).
Re: eSIM Limitations (Score:2)
It is not a simple click click process to get a new eSIM from all providers. For some it's a huge PITA. Not allowing porting of this entirely-software token is needlessly limiting.
Re: (Score:2)
Then at that point, I'd be questioning using that provider, or using eSIM with that provider.
The reason for needing to contact the provider (In some way) is to connect to the provisioning system and issue a new certificate (eSIM) and update the billing platform with the eSIM details. I'd also say to invalidate the old certificate / SIM card / eSIM if it's marked as lost, but that's not a guarantee. You might be assigning a second eSIM to your smart watch so that it's connected to the same account.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't really understand why or how you are arguing this point.
With a physical SIM, I don't need to contact anyone. I take it out of one phone and put it in another, then restart it. It takes 5 seconds. This is something I need to do *AT LEAST* once a month.
The idea that with eSIM I need to deactivate and re-activate a new SIM every time I want to use my plan on a different device is ridiculous, especially when this is all SOFTWARE. There is absolutely zero reason whatsoever that I should not be able to ru
Re: (Score:2)
> The idea that with eSIM I need to deactivate and re-activate a new SIM every time I want to use my plan on a different device is ridiculous, especially when this is all SOFTWARE. There is absolutely zero reason whatsoever that I should not be able to run an eSIM migration tool on phone A, have it display the QR code, scan it with phone B, and have it be transferred over - none.
Congratulations, you've now managed to steal SIM cards from randoms with no security whatsoever.
False comparison (Score:2)
None of [the listed means for setting up eSIM cards] are as simple as just popping out a tray and plopping in your SIM card.
Look, there are valid complaints to be made against eSIM, but this is not one of them. The summary is falsely comparing a first-time setup vs. switching between cards after setup. Not at all the same thing.
In most cases I can be set up with a new eSIM in a few minutes from the comfort of my home via some quick interactions in an app or on a website. No need to wait a few days for a physical thing to arrive in the mail, nor do I need to drive down to the nearest store to pick one up. The first time I install
Re: (Score:2)
But it takes mere seconds to take my physical sim out of one phone and put it in a different one all without having to pay my carrier an activation fee.
Re: (Score:2)
But it takes mere seconds to take my physical sim out of one phone and put it in a different one all without having to pay my carrier an activation fee.
Who said anything about activation fees for eSIM users? The summary doesn't mention them. The article doesn't mention them. None of the websites for any of the major US or international carriers seem to mention them (I even found statements from T-Mobile and AT&T that outright say they don't charge them). Depending on your carrier, you may have an activation fee for a new line or an activation fee for a new device, but the distinction between eSIM and SIM has no bearing on either of those. Other than so
Re: (Score:1)
> some quick interactions in an app or on a website.
So now you require an internet connection, a data plan and a working server on the other end when none was needed before. You may need a second mobile device or a computer as well. Did you have to give up your information also?
This "newer, more convenient" introduces dependencies (aka points of failure) where none existed. And your Personal Inf
The advantages on the user side aren't that big (Score:2)
I mean I can swap a SIM-card between devices even without any cooperation from the operator, I just pull it out from one device and put it into another one.
Switching between SIM-cards also usually is trivial as most (decent) phones will have at least 2 SIM-slots.
There are a few operators which continuously swap the card profile to protect your privacy by swapping the IMSI. That's a minor privacy advantage considering that the IMEI still remains constant.
Re: (Score:2)
I just pull it out from one device and put it into another one.
I did this recently. After 10minutes looking for a paperclip I gave up.
Switching between SIM-cards also usually is trivial as most (decent) phones will have at least 2 SIM-slots.
A slot that usually requires a special tool to open and requires you to precariously balance tiny little cards in a little tray while slotting it in. To this day I don't think my girlfriend has ever managed to pop in a SIM card without getting on her hands and knees looking for the one that just fell out.
But you're missing the big advantage: you can provision a service from anyone, not just companies that can mail you something, or have
Google Fi (Score:2)
Google Fi lets you download an eSim quickly and easily. It's absolutely no trouble.
Android eSIM on Verizon was easy (Score:2)
As I have said before... (Score:2)
Not being easily able to swap the esim to another device stops you from testing the esim in another device.
"Hello, customer support, sorry for your 17 hour hold, we are experiencing an unexpectedly number of calls! You say you have 7 esims that work perfectly on your device but ours doesn't. It is your device that is at fault, factory reset it and I am sure it will fix the problem. If you have any further problems, please go to our web page. Thank you. Goodbye."
Useless for multiple devices in a family. (Score:1)
eSIM means you pay more when traveling, (Score:2)
In many countries you can not get prepaid local eSIM, so you need to use one of those international services that are more expensive.
As example going to Philippines(my most frequent destination outside Europe where roaming is included) I pay $6 for two weeks with 22+16GB data and unlimited calls/texts to all local networks. But it requires a physical sim that I can get at the airport when arriving.
The cheapest of the eSIMs that I have found is $12 for only 10GB data and no extras, the call ones are $50+
Nei
Beware of the "eSIM", the argument echoes... (Score:4, Insightful)
the earlier similar fight over cable card [wikipedia.org]
Here's what I mean:
When we were all contemplating the move from NTSC television to the [then] newfangled HDTV, the cable companies all wanted a way to protect premium programming and EVERYBODY else wanted to do away with the hated cable boxes. The new HDTV spec included the new digital tuners, including the QAM [wikipedia.org] tuners the cable people wanted - so for encryption without the hated monthly-rented boxes all that was needed was a socked for a card that would accept a card from the cable company to handle their proprietary decryption. TVs were sold with Cable Card sockets and service providers could rent PCMCIA-like Cable Cards that users could insert into a standardized socket. (sorta like users being able to insert a standardized SIM into the standardized socket in any phone). Incidentally, some here may well remember that when we all moved to HDTV, we could plug our TVs right into the cableTV cable and use the tuner in the TV.
Service providers soon realized they did not like this scheme, and they largely refused to support it. To the TV makers, all that hardware (the sockets and the components to support the functionality) added complexity and cost, and thus caused higher prices and competitive issues in the retail market, while most users were not using them (since many service providers would not support them) so it simply made no sense to put them into most models. At his point, it's nearly impossible to find an HDTV with a Cable Card socket, even though they were part of the spec for what a standard HDTV would be.
End users of TVs are now, in many places, back to paying monthly rental fees for cable boxes (even often one for every TV even for basic cable, and even if they are not subscribed to any premium service). It's extra costs to the users, it's wasteful, and it's one segment (a service provider) of a larger tech segment (the TV segment) grabbing control of standards and twisting things to suit their business model, standards-be-damned.
Why I think this matters with phones:
The standardized physical SIM made it easy to take a phone from one provider to another, and for some people who travel and wanted the option, phones with multiple SIM sockets were available - but as long as you had a phone with one or more of the standard physical socket, you could use the services of a provider by installing a SIM. Ditching the SIM for an "eSIM" (a buzzword for a blob of opaque code) is simply a gateway to an inevitable push by unsavory service providers - first it will be a binary blob, but eventually it will be proprietary apps. Once it's an app, there will be bugs and revs and incompatabilities - and it will not be long and things like a Pine64 phone will be made impossible- they'll only make the apps for certain phones with certain operating systems. To have a usable phone, you will have to have a relatively new (new every other year?) "compatible model" phone, from an "approved vendor" running proprietary apps from the phone vendor that will be closed-source spy machines which may morph over time to merge with China-style "social credit score" schemes and all sorts of other anti-freedom and anti-piracy garbage. People who are OK with this and think it's great because it will only oppress people who disagree with them need to think this over and learn a little history... [ushmm.org]
Embedded devices (Score:2)
A big target of esims is the embedded device (IoT) market.
It allows an embedded device to provision as part of the standard programming configuration process, devices can be reconfigured remotely, and you don't have to worry about the user messing around with fragile card trays.
There's also new systems being proposed which allow the sim to be integrated into the secure area of an ARM processor, so no extra hardware would be required.