When Apple announced the iPhone XR and iPhone Xs, they announced that their new iPhones would support dual SIM. However unlike most dual SIM smartphones that actually rely on dual physical SIM cards, the new iPhones will instead rely on one physical SIM and one eSIM (China’s version is the exception as it will use dual physical SIMs).
Unfortunately this means having to wait on carriers to support the eSIM format, which in a support document posted on AT&T’s website (via 9to5Mac) has revealed that the carrier is the first in the US to support the eSIMs on the new iPhones. Of course what this means is that you will need to purchase a separate plan in order to utilize that second SIM, but whether or not you have the need for that will depend on you.
Apple had previously rolled out the iOS 12.1 update which enabled the eSIM, although like we said, your mileage may vary as not all carriers support it yet. This means that if you’re traveling and need a second SIM for local use, you might not be able to use the eSIM, so that’s something to take into consideration where you might prefer swapping your primary SIM to eSIM and keeping the physical SIM card slot empty.
AT&T won’t be the only carrier to support the new iPhones’ eSIM as last month it was reported that Verizon is also preparing to enable support for eSIM later this month.
Filed in . Read more about AT&T, iPhone, Iphone Xr and Iphone Xs.