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Comment by johnebgd | Hacker News Reader

Esim is a mature and excellent technology. This is overdue.

Not everywhere, as others in this thread have mentioned. As a frequent traveler I'll be probably holding onto the last physical sim iPhone for many years until everywhere I travel to has it all ironed out.

They’ll iron it out pretty quickly if iPhones can’t use their network.

As a frequent traveler I can’t imagine going back to physical SIMs, now I can carry all my data plans on my phone and don’t have to waste time looking for a place to buy a prepaid plan.

There are a ton of websites where you can immediately get esims for almost every country, why bother with physical sims?

Thanks. I never knew, plus I haven't troubled in 2 years :). What is a good recommendation?

Airalo is the one I find myself using the most, amazing coverage and great support.

I’ve probably used their sims in 30+ countries at this point, they’re even available in more exotic places like St Barthelemy or Moldova.

In some places the e-sim plans are inflated and poorer value compared to the deals on physical sim cards sold. For example the unlimited data plans might be only available by sim rather than purchasing data packs

They’re rarely poorer value if your time is worth anything, if getting a prepaid SIM costs me a 30min detour I might as well be setting $100 on fire.

As a traveler you can have 10 or more eSIM profiles. That means you can have a great 130 multi-country eSIM like the AIS eSIM2Fly or if you go to a single country you could get their local travel eSIM ( for example the Thailand DTAC Tourist eSIM ). Just switch between your active eSIM as needed. iPhones have more than enough eSIM slots to accommodate your travels, with no more need for plastic chip fiddling.

In my country the third major provider still doesn’t support it, the second (Vodafone) started supporting it in 2021. (EU member state.)

They will if Apple does this.

Let me guess: Germany?

Some providers in DE also don’t allow eSIM on prepaid plans - you have to be on a contract to be able to use eSIM at all (looking at you, Telekom).

Well, if Apple really goes this way, you will see them support it pronto.

so, anything one can do if one wants to work with this technology on their own. I suppose an Asterisk extension or something, I tried searching for eSim on github but seems it's a pretty generic acronym for people to pick.

Nope, nothing you can do on your own. It still requires being a carrier and operating physical infrastructure. It's not VoIP.

> Esim is a mature and excellent technology. This is overdue.

And this is the first time I've heard of it. (and in with https://xkcd.com/1053/ before someone else does)

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