Can You Activate a New Unlocked Android Smartphone Without SIM

[My Life Is Tech]

Here's my question. If I were to buy a new unlocked android smartphone from Ebay, would I be able to power it on and use it without inserting a SIM card, and just use it as basically a iPod Touch? And just use WiFi? Please reply soon. Thanks.

 

[hang-the-9]

Yes you can use it, but you can't "activate" it. Depending on the model you may need to read about how to bypass the initial "call to setup phone" screen.

 

[My Life Is Tech]

Yes you can use it, but you can't "activate" it. Depending on the model you may need to read about how to bypass the initial "call to setup phone" screen.

Hmm...I wonder how you'd deal with that...also would you have to do it again if you factory-reset the phone?

 

[hang-the-9]

Yes you will have to go past the activation screen if you reset the phone.

 

[Noprompt]

Hi,

Buying an unlocked smartphone just means that you can use any SIM card in your phone, or in other words the phone isn't restricted to work with only one carrier, that's all. You will only "activate" the connectivity of the phone to broad networks, the firmware features like wifi are independent of the activation, to have those features working you only need to charge your phone and turn it on.

Then, if you buy this type of device you will have available all the features that come with it (music, wifi, organizers and more..) however, if you don't use a SIM card you won't get access to data, which is the element that allows using apps like instagram, facebook, twitter an more, you won't be able to check your email or browse the web either.

Hope that helps!

 

[My Life Is Tech]

Hi,

Buying an unlocked smartphone just means that you can use any SIM card in your phone, or in other words the phone isn't restricted to work with only one carrier, that's all. You will only "activate" the connectivity of the phone to broad networks, the firmware features like wifi are independent of the activation, to have those features working you only need to charge your phone and turn it on.

Then, if you buy this type of device you will have available all the features that come with it (music, wifi, organizers and more..) however, if you don't use a SIM card you won't get access to data, which is the element that allows using apps like instagram, facebook, twitter an more, you won't be able to check your email or browse the web either.

Hope that helps!

Would I still be able to use WiFi however, and use the apps on my WiFi at home?

 

[Noprompt]

Hello,

You might be able to connect to WiFi without having a SIM card inserted in you unlocked android device, that's because the WiFi signal come from an device that's not the SIM card (comes from a modem) . Also, you might be able to run apps that require internet to work because you will have data connection through WiFi. Remember that WiFi is a type of local area network (LAN) and by connecting to that network you might be able to get access to the data available in that LAN; however, it's required that your device comes with WiFi feature enable.

Regards