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You love everything about your Apple iPhone except the carrier. If your device is two years old or more, you may have thought there was nothing you can do about it. This, however, is not the case. Even previous model iPhones can be unlocked to switch carriers and SIM cards.
Unlocking your iPhone is perfectly legal, but it must be done through the current carrier. To unlock your iPhone, you will have to contact your carrier with a request to unlock your device. Many do offer this as a free service. They will determine if your phone is an eligible candidate to be unlocked. This may partially depend on whether or not the phone is still in the process of being paid for. If the device can be unlocked, the process of doing so may take a few days.
After your carrier has confirmed that your iPhone is unlocked, there are two ways to begin use with your new carrier. If you have a SIM card for the carrier you are switching your phone to, you can simply replace your current SIM card with that one. After that you will have to go through the normal iPhone setup process. It is possible that the SIM card that you insert may not be supported. This may or may not mean that the carrier is not supported. If your iPhone gives you a such a warning, back up your files using iCloud or iTunes, then contact your carrier. It could be that the unlock was not applied in their system.
The other way to switch to your new carrier is to delete, set up, and restore. First you will have to back up your files using iCloud for cloud storage or iTunes to move them to a computer. Once they are all backed up, you can erase your iPhone, restoring it to factory settings. When setting up the phone again, you can restore your files from iCloud or from the personal computer that you saved them to on iTunes. Both options will be available during the setup process.
If you are switching carriers, unlocking your iPhone is definitely doable as long as it's being done the right way.
You can also use the tool below to unlock your Apple iPhone using the IMEI code through our partner, DoctorSIM.
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