Using eSIMs with devices that only have a physical SIM slot via a 9eSIM SIM car

What's the reason for these lower prices? Data only 5gb/month for $5 or $6 seems to be the summary of the link, amazing! I think the answer is there is lots of competition and they've driven the price down to this point. That's an incredible price.

Of course this would be immensely useful. For example, can I put this in my vehicle with built in maps (or just have a hotspot in my vehicle to use with a tablet). As a price comparison, in the us there are some EVs that charge $100/year for basically this, most charge a lot more. That's $8.33/month, so only a bit more than $6 or 7. But in the us it's hard or impossible get anything that low for just raw service, I can't find anything like that.

It's in the last sentence - GMX FreePhone. It's not one of those "travel eSIMs" though, you need to live in Germany.

>To use the free service on a non eSIM capable phone?

Yes. I paid 5 €/month for LIDL Connect for 1 GB. I don't need much mobile data and in just a few months the cost of the adapter is amortized. It might also come handy in the future if I travel abroad.

That would be mine, yeah. Set up an old phone with one of those esims from a company that offers small amounts of data for free for watching an ad, then drop it in my glove box as a backup in case something happens to my real phone.

It requires that you give them your bank account details.

The stated reason is because you can call premium services and run up a charges even with a free service.

Done.

Sent.

Sent.

I'll clean up the stuff so I can not be identified as the leaker and send it to you.

Sent.

Sent.

I also bought an esim.me card a while ago before they started to jack up the prices. It worked one or two times, but stopped working after.

I ordered a 5ber yesterday, and waiting for it to arrive.

Also a +1 for JMP. not glitch free, but I think the glitches were in me, and in the eSim provider. The tool(s) do what they say on the (virtual) box.

+1 jmp a bit weird interface but no artificial restrictions like esimme

I use an esim.me card in my phone and once you program the card with the esim.me app, it shows up as a normal physical sim card on the phone with whatever plan the esim was for. I believe you can even move it to another device and it will still show up with the same plan, though I haven't tried that.

The only issue I've had with it is that some esim provider apps refuse to work on a phone that doesn't have esim capabilities, and since the phone sees the card as a normal sim card, the apps don't work. I assume that will be an issue for any of these cards. Not a huge issue though, most esim apps/websites will still let you get the QR code or download the profile even if your phone doesn't natively support esim, and you just enter that into the esim.me app to program the card.

I've personally never tried since my phone supports e-sim but people on the internet report good findings with the 5ber card (note that you need the "Ultra" card for iPhone, the other ones are android only).

I forget if it was with Lyca or a similar brand, but they would deduct 5 cents for each sms before you setup a plan. I was incredibly careful to not do anything and disabled almost everything but apparently iPhone phones home in a way that’s totally hidden from the user and most providers hide and zero the charge but not these rando brands.

Another 5 EUR down to tube because I only had 4,95 for my 5 EUR plan.

Dunno why I put my SIM card in first but I guess I had to for some reason (was on wifi and had access to a computer)

True. This is what I used to do, but every country does this their SIM setup slightly different:

1. Do I need to show a passport yes/no?

2. Who sells the sim? Do I need to sit in a queue to purchase one? How do I top up?

3. Who is the best telco provider in the region I'm in?

4. etc etc

I'd prefer eSIM all day for that reason. Also, yes I can load up as many local/region eSIMs I want in case I need more, but honestly 20GB is plenty for a full year.

A 4G/5G router creates a "real" WiFi network rather than a personal network.

Hotspotting is great for 1 or 2 devices, but devices are reluctant to connect to a personal hotspot automatically (Apple devices, at least). You have to manually select/tap the hotspot every time, which gets to be a pain when you have multiple devices and you're using it as your daily, primary internet connection.

I might also want to leave the house/hotel room/office for whatever reason with my phone but keep other devices connected. In this case the router can either be fixed in place (and plugged in) or travel with me on battery. Flexibility!

Hotspot tether traffic on iPhone won't be tunneled over a VPN connection. This is what the Mudi router enables over LTE.

Lots of iOS stuff will bypass any configured VPN, including hotspot (but also APNS and other hardware-serial-linked OS stuff).

Yes! I had to flash it with beta firmware since the eSim Manager disappears using Airalo.

https://dl.gl-inet.com/release/router/testing/e750/4.3.21

   Fixed the problem that esim manage page is lost after installing some esim profiles.

I own a Mudi v1, it is Chinese and 'just runs OpenWrt' (with mods). I had to use such device for a previous job (not w/eSIM tho). Battery life was good, but now not so much, and battery isn't user replaceable.

Interesting, do you know why that is the case? Does it use BIP as a communication channel, and the iPhone doesn't route that over Wi-Fi?

In case it's of interest, please see https://osmocom.org/projects/foss-ims-client/wiki/VoWiFi_wit... for an existing way how to talk to VoWiFi carriers from entirely free/libre/open-source software. It's basically a hacked-up version of Asterisk that has IMS client support, plus a modified strongswan IPsec client.

Is there a link to this client? I'd be interested to play around with it.

At least Vodafone Germany intentionally blocks (or used to block) foreign IPs for their gateway. I'll always trust them to needlessly ruin perfectly fine technologies.

Fortunately, as far as I remember at least iPhones route VoWiFi traffic over a VPN, if any is connected, so that's one way to still use it abroad.

As noted by other commenters, some carriers (I think all of the UK carriers) use IP-based geoblocking to ensure that Wi-Fi Calling only works when using an IP address registered in the UK.

I have a dual-SIM Pixel 7, the eSIM "slot" has a data-only subscription, the other slot has a pay-as-you-go SIM that I can make phone calls with (I make so few phone calls to actual lines, that having credit that I can top-up every few months is much more cheaper than paying monthly for free minutes). The PAYG SIM offers WiFi calling, and the phone appears to even offer "WiFi"-calling over the data connection, for a much better audio quality.

The non-standard method is to get the SMS to a delivering SMSC (which is the same network component that's used for mobile originated SMS delivery, which is standardized).

Once it's enqueued in an SMSC, there is no more distinction between how it got there, as far as I understand (at least downstream from there; delivery reports to the sender might again be proprietary for non-mobile senders).

> The non-standard methods work fine if you're connected to the network directly but if you're overseas that will not be the case and so you can't receive these non-standard messages.

This is actually not particular to the way in which SMS have been enqueued, but rather to how they're delivered: The sending SMSC has to "dial" pretty deep into both the recipient's home and visited network in the original implementation. This means that they need a commercial agreement and technical integration with both of them.

Usually, problems/inconsistencies occur when they do know how to deliver to the recipient number's home network (because if they can't, they'd probably have rejected the message at SMSC submission time), but are then redirected to a given visited network with which they don't have interconnectivity.

This problem (and some others, including serious privacy concerns) is solved by a newer technology called "SMS home routing". In that model, there's something like a proxy in the recipient's home network that essentially poses as the receiving phone to the sending SMSC, and then uses the home network's resources to do actual delivery. This usually leads to more consistent experiences, and allows things like a "received message log". (Without a home router, the recipient's home network never sees the message content when the recipient is roaming!)

Calls can freely be handed over between VoLTE and VoWiFi, depending on signal quality, and that often happens without the user's knowledge or explicit consent.

This means that "no roaming costs over WiFi" is a very dicy proposition, as a carrier either needs to restrict handovers (and I don't even know if that's allowed by the spec, not to mention the implications of dropping calls when going out of WiFi Range), cover the costs themselves, or move them onto the unsuspecting user if a handover happens.

There's also a technical hurdle of the telco can't know where you're coming from over the Internet. The terminate your end of the vowifi call and from there they only charge for the connection as though it originated in their network, which is all they know for sure (that is their SIM and your account that's authenticated from somewhere in the world)

To the dead comment: No, OpenEUICC does not need a rooted phone. Mine is not rooted and it works.

They do not "just" rebrand it.

OpenEUICC needs a rooted phone, while the provider-branded packages like EasyEUICC can run in user space (and thus needs to be signed with the corresponding hash).

-----8<-----

There are two variants of this project:

OpenEUICC: The full-fledged privileged variant. Due to its privilege requirement, OpenEUICC must be placed inside /system/priv-app and be signed with the platform certificate.

The preferred way to including OpenEUICC in a system image is to build it along with AOSP.

Note: When privileged, OpenEUICC supports any eUICC chip that implements the SGP.22 standard, internal or external. However, there is no guarantee that external (removable) eSIMs actually follow the standard. Please DO NOT submit bug reports for non-functioning removable eSIMs. They are NOT officially supported unless they also support / are supported by EasyEUICC, the unprivileged variant.

EasyEUICC: Unprivileged version that can run as a user app. This version supports two modes of operation: Inserted, removable eSIMs: Due to obvious security requirements, EasyEUICC is only able to access eSIM chips whose ARF/ARA contains the hash of EasyEUICC's signing certificate.

USB CCID Card Readers: Only T=0 readers that use the standard USB CCID protocol are supported. In this mode, EasyEUICC can access any eSIM chip loaded in the card reader regardless of their ARF/ARA, as long as they implement the SGP.22 standard.

Prebuilt release-mode EasyEUICC apks can be downloaded here For removable eSIM chip vendors: to have your chip supported by official builds of EasyEUICC when inserted, include the ARA-M hash 2A2FA878BC7C3354C2CF82935A5945A3EDAE4AFA

It seems that bringing up the city/state box after you enter zip code is being slow right now. if you wait a bit do they show up for you after entering zip code?

Sure you can do it if there’s a module to desolder, but many phones will just use TrustZone/Secure Enclave and you’re not desoldering that…

It’s to connect phone numbers to identities. Getting a physical sim in China involves going in person to a store where they keep your passport and a mugshot (you hold a paper with your number on it) in a database.

There’s no free WiFi without requiring a phone number. It allows the government to connect internet users to real identities.

Apparently there aren't any eSIMs in China that include a phone number. I'm not sure why.

I think this is why Apple releases the latest iPhones with physical SIM trays in China while the latest iPhones in North America are eSIM only

A big reason is that an eSIM is virtual, which means anyone can easily get an eSIM that allows them to punch through the great firewall -- a defeat that the Chinese government would never allow to happen

I only know eSIM providers for data

In which countries are eSIMs cheaper? I have never encountered this in Africa or in Asia. I was just in Vietnam, a local SIM was probably 50% cheaper than anything I could find on esimdb.

Currently I'm in Georgia, unlimited internet for a week is 9 GEL, or around 3ish USD per week. The cheapest on esdimdb is 19 USD for unlimited internet for a week.

What we usually do when we travel is buy the cheapest eSIM, usually on some introductory offer to get like 1GB for 1 USD (so we can order taxis, maps etc), then go to a local provider and get a local SIM.

One place where an eSIM was a good choice was China. I don't quite understand how it works, but it seems if you use an eSIM in China you get around the great firewall without needing a VPN.

I wish eSIMs were cheaper, so I wouldn't have to deal with the headache of doing that. When going to local providers, sometimes they offer an eSIM option, but there is usually no price difference.

Currently traveling, and the savings are real. Although in this case it’s the opposite: travel eSIMs rates are about $80 for data for 30 days, whereas a cheap local prepaid SIM card is $8-16 (but with no eSIM option)

I have not yet traveled to a place that doesn't have cheap prepaid SIM on the Airport, or some Internet cafes.

I expected to use an eSIM when I went abroad for a month last year. It turned out the providers offering "travel eSIM" are 2 to 4 times more expensive compared to buying a prepaid physical sim at the counter valid for 30 days.

Could one make an all-software sim card emulator which would enable this?

Or does the esim spec have some kind of DRM to require you to use physical hardware with an embedded yet secret-to-you key?

Sorry, move them from what to what? Surely an eSIM isn't locked to the first phone I use it on?

He's probably talking about how on iPhones[1] and some Androids[2], you can do something called "wifi calling using cellular data" or "backup calling", which basically enables you to roam for "free" on your one SIM by using wifi-calling over the data connection of the second SIM. It only triggers if the first SIM doesn't have any reception, but there's workarounds for that, but in any case it's not as simple as installing an eSIM and getting free roaming.

[1] https://cdsassets.apple.com/live/7WUAS350/images/ios/ios-18-...

[2] https://lemmy.world/post/58708

Are you sure? There's a pretty good overlap these days in globally supported bands on at least a baseline level.

You might not be able to use a provider's extended/rural or dense urban canyon filler cells, but I haven't yet been to a place where I didn't get any roaming connectivity at all.

In some countries (the US included), providers restrict the ability of devices not capable of e.g. VoIP to connect on certain bands (as there is no circuit switched fallback available there, and there's an FCC mandate that calls, in particular 911 calls, have to work wherever data works), but that's usually not applied to inbound roaming guests.

This worked for me, French carrier "Free", and install new eSIM while in Spain.

But now I have doubts, especially outside the EU: if it doesn't work, that would loose one of the advantages that I'd sort of expected eSIM to have: if your phone gets lost / stolen while abroad, you could just get a new eSIM from your carrier immediately, and set it up on your replacement phone.

In my case, my bank uses mandatory SMS 2FA for setting up their app on a new phone, thus making it impossible to make purchases with my card without having the being able to set up the app.

So I'd be back to the oldschool method of having a fried back at home set up the new eSIM, receive the 2FA code...

I think almost all carriers require this. I've seen mentions that the Google Fi eSIM requires US towers to activate, but can be moved / reinstalled later without them (didn't test it though).