Wow, sorry for my poor choice of words!
I was just frustrated as there were several times earlier this year where an eSim would have been extremely useful for me - and Telstra were clearly dragging their heels.
However as their new plans no longer include international roaming and calls, it’s a bit redundant - but I have specced my iPhone 11 Pro Max with an eSim anyway.
September 20, btw.
Has anyone thought of going eSIM-only as a potential security measure against someone popping your SIM card if your device is lost/stolen?
Probably not super necessary, given that there are plenty of other ways that your device is useless to a would-be thief, and is probably better used in conjunction with a bunch of other security-conscious features like disabling Siri/Control Centre without being unlocked, but might be an idea?
I’d like phones to get to a point where we can have multiple virtual SIMs with no physical SIM.
Multiple simultaneous?
Because you can definitely have multiple virtual SIMs on an iPhone XR/XS/XS Max now, even though you can only use one at a time.
Good to know, I did not know that.
Will an eSIM service work overseas even if not included in the plan? I.E. PAYG? I know you can chose which SIM to use for data service too BTW, so iMessage on your main number will work if the SIM is online even if not using the Telstra service for data (say you get a local data sim while travelling).
I’m not sure if it makes a difference if it’s an eSim or a normal SIM, but I hadn’t really thought of that.
I don’t know for sure but if the roaming country Telco doesn’t support eSIM then I suspect they wouldn’t support a roaming eSIM either…
I wouldn’t have assumed that. I read eSIM is a “programmable SIM” - so I guessed it was more about whether the carrier supports eSIM to “create” a SIM and the network tower probably can’t tell the difference.
Well that’s the key isn’t it… I assumed it was handled differently at a network level but perhaps not.
eSim experience not great so far - been waiting over an hour after activating my service to have any kind of signal. Telstra says it will take 2-4 hours (!) to activate the service. What a joke! Physical SIM cards are almost instant.
It finally got activated about 6 hours after I put the request through 
I have an iPhone for work and one for home. Wonder if I could get my existing Telstra number changed over to an eSIM so I could then use one phone for everything.
My hope is more travelling travelling with a local sim for data. I’d need to convert my sim to esim to do that.
Depending on where you’re going, there are now quite a few telcos in various countries that support instant provisioning of eSIMs. I.e. download an app, get an eSIM activated and working on your device in minutes.
Nothing preventing you from keeping both/all of your services as eSIMs, of course — and less little bits of plastic to lose that way — provided you’re OK with only using one at a time.
Good reading: The state of eSIM in Australia | Beau Giles
Thanks for the link!
So I am ordering myself an eSIM from Telstra. So I asked my online agent dude “Doro the Great” whether I can just transfer this number to a new iPhone if/when I get one in the future. You can do this with the Apple Watch but apparently not with the iPhone, you need to order a new eSIM QR code for a new phone. Seems a bit clunky to me but maybe I’ve misread something.
Not sure that’s true, Apple says you can scan the QR code that you used to activate your eSIM in the first place to transfer it to a new phone.
The difference is probably how the Apple Watch always shares the same number as your iPhone.
Yes I find it hard to believe which is basically why I mentioned it, it didn’t seem right to me. Surely the purpose of eSIM is to make it easier for carriers as well as consumers.
