What are the advantages of an unlocked cell phone?

Having an “unlocked” phone just means you have a phone without a SIM card. The SIM card stores all the information from a sell phone subscriber, which in turn allows that phone to be activated under a specific carrier’s service. Essentially, an “unlocked” phone is a blank slate.

The only thing that does for you is it allows you to take that phone and use it with any carrier.

Personally, that’s not much of a perk when you consider the cons. Any phone worth getting unlocked and going to another carrier isn’t going to function correctly; some phones are built with features that are exclusive to a carrier (iPhone, Droids, etc). That’s why you commonly see these characters have SIMILAR kinds of phones, but very rarely the same exact things. Also, using an unlocked phone may violate some warranty/insurance policies you have in your phone plan or with the phone’s manufacturer.

Also, “unlocked” doesn’t mean you don’t have to get a contract. You will always have to buy a plan to make the phone operate, the only thing is buying an unlocked phone deletes the necessity to sign a 2 year renewal vs being able to pay for a 1 year plan.

Hey, I am not talking about that kind of lock. See, when you buy a Cell phone with a contract, the reason that they are cheap is that they are software lock to only work on that provider. So the cell phone will cost you $0 dollars and can only work with that carrier and you are under contract or $400 and can be used with many other providers.Like you can buy an unlocked Iphone and use it with Verizon a couple of months and then switch to T-Mobile or AT&T but it will cost you like $600 for an unlocked Iphone. If you buy it locked then you can only use it with AT&T and sign a contract, but it will cost you less than $200. Apparently there are huge benefits of unlocked phones but I can’t find any other reasons.

All cell phones that you get with contracts are locked. Unlocked cell phones are found on Amazon, newegg, ebay etc.

This the phone I want to get. I can insert my current sim card and use it with AT&T and because is not a phone AT&T carry I don’t have to sign up for a data plan even thought is a smartphone. I can use the regular unlimited data plan for $10 instead of the usual $25. http://funadvice.com/r/bf9465v9jha

So I can get unlimited internet at $10 a month saving me $15 each month but will have to pay nearly $500 up front for the phone but no contract. Or get a Smartphone android or Iphone with AT&T for $200 for the device and then pay the $25 a month for data. At the end of the two year contract because the extra data access cost of $25 under contract. I would end up paying about the same amount of money because the data plan is more expensive plus the cost of the device.

An Unlocked phone will work on any cell carrier as long as they use the same network type that the phone works on. For example if it says its an unlocked GSM phone - it will work on any GSM network, but you cant use it on a CDMA network.

an unlocked phone is a phone you can stick any sim into..

the phones here are locked to the provider you buy from so for example im on t-mobile and my phone is locked to them and they are the only ones with teh code to unlock it.

but after 6 months t-mobile give me the unlock code for free, anything before that and i would have to pay them for the code.

so the answer is in that :p

That’s not necessarily true. There are countries outside the U.S. which produce phones you know. Those phones are produced unlocked. It is possible to get the real thing (actually quality tends to be better for some reason).

Hi torturdchaos,

         I agree with you.  Once you unlock your phone  from the current network provider (In which network your phone is locked to) , you can use it to any other GSM networks. You can get a unlock code from your network provider/from any of the third-party service providers like  http://www.unlock-free.com/  to unlock your phone,

Unlocked cell phone means You can use with different network. Normally all mobiles locked by particular provider. So you cannot switch over from another network. In this situation you must unlock your cell phone. There are lot of advantages available to unlock your gsmphone: 1)Once unlocked your mobile you can use it with different network 2)You can resale your mobile at higher price 3)Roaming charges is also cut. If you need blackberry unlock code you can visit this site http://www.unbblock.com/blackberry/rs18wp8/ here you can get the code and unlock you mobile.