how do i know if my iphone is unlocked

Thanks.

Hello i originally did what the email from att said to do. somehow i lost all my text messagees in the process but whatever. But it did not work nor did i get the HOLY message itunes is suppose to give you. And then did a lot of research and found this info and did it twice and got the message. So thanks to everyone on this post.

I have tried all of the tips on this thread and am still coming up without an unlocked iphone 4. When I enter the IMEI into IMEI.info, it still shows the phone as "locked." This is especially frustrating because I received unlock authorization emails from AT&T for both my wife's and my own iphone 4. My wife's unlocked on the first try (With "congratulations" message) upon restoring through itunes, however I've tried restoring probably 10 times over the last 6 days. Contacted AT&T who told me everything was correct on thier end and to contact AppleCare, but I don't really want to pay $20 to talk to them if it's not absolutely necessary.

Is anyone else having continued trouble? Any other tips? Should I go to the Apple store or buy a SIM card from another carrier and try restoring then?

Thanks.

Some good news. I had the idea of submitting a second unlock request to AT&T and I received the approval e-mail a day later. I attempted a restore and still did not receive the "congratulations" message in iTunes, but my IMEI is now showing as unlocked on IMEI.org. I have a t-mobile SIM card on its way and will verify that the phone is indeed unlocked and give a final update then.

Thanks for all the adivice... However, I found that I was having the same issue as a few others trying to unlock their iPhone. We never got the "Congrats" message and when we visited the Apple store they confirmed our iPhones were unlocked. It's obiviously not a foolproof process but if you're in doubt visit an Apple store.

kudos to Thingo75 for figuring it out. If you didn't see the 'Congrats' message, just follow his instruction and do a reset, delete contents and setting. Once reset is complete you should see the message. Once you see the message you can restore.

I have two iPhone 4 models here, both restored multiple times. IMEI.org and AT&T both confirmed they were unlocked, but I couldn't get iTunes to tell me so.

After your 'reset on a string' method, the beautiful bold iTunes message erupted!

thanks, quick and easy =)

Thingo75 wrote:

Hello,

For all those that are still having no luck unlocking their iPhone with the instructions provided by ATT. Try this method. I have an iPhone 4 and it took me hours of backing up and factory restoring thru iTunes before i tried this method (by accident!!). I finally got the "Congratulations. Your iPhone Has Been Unlocked" message. It worked for me. Hopefully it'll work for you.

Make sure your iPhone is backed up if you want to keep your info. You might also need to update it to the latest firmware if it is required. I'm already on 6.0 so i didn't have any issues

1. Open iTunes (let it completely load)

2. Plug in your iPhone

--- Then on your iPhone--

3. Select "Settings"

4. Select "General"

5. Select "Reset"

6. Select "Erase All Content and Settings"

7. Select "Erase iPhone" to confirm

8. Select "Erase iPhone" to confirm again

The process of wiping out all data and resetting your phone to factory default has been started. Keep it plugged in and don't touch it. Once its done and reboots you should see, in big black bold letters in iTunes, saying "Congratulation. Your iPhone is Unlocked". It was a relief that iTunes finally confirmed my phone was unlocked. Good luck y'all!!

This worked for me. Thank you, Thingo75! Putting my stuff back on from backup now. I appreciate it BIG TIME!

One note about my experience that differed from Thingo75's.

I followed the instructions but did not see the "Congratulations" message so I did the following ...

1. Disconnected the iPhone from my Mac

2. Followed steps 3 through 6

3. After the phone rebooted I THEN plugged it in.

4. Voila! "Congratulation. Your iPhone is Unlocked" mesage appeared.

Go figure. Hope this helps.

Summary: AT&T approved my unlock nearly 5 months ago and since then we tried repeatedly - using every method suggested here and elsewhere, including Thingo's - but we never got the Congrats message and the phone did not work with other SIMs (such as TMobile and SIMS from other countries). Among other things, we tried:

• erasing the iPhone 4 from the Settings/General options on the device itself, then connecting to iTunes, restoring, then restoring from backup
• Restoring in Itunes, then Restoring from backup
• above steps with TMobile SIM
• above steps but now with the original AT&T SIM (which was no longer active)
• above steps on the iTunes account of the original owner
• above steps on the iTunes account of the new owner

Nothing worked. AT&T wouldn't talk to us because we were no longer customers. After about 40 restores and 5 months of this headache we gave up. Then one late evening recently I went to the genius bar. I took all the paperwork, which inlcuded a printout from AT&T's website which showed that the request for unlock had been approved 5 months ago and that we had been restoring in futility since then. Two Specialists politely told me that they could do nothing - they cannot unlock. I said I understood that but I wanted some information about future steps. The second specialist finally consulted with someone senior in a back room and then two options were suggested to me:

• try contacting AT&T using a current customer's phone number (to access AT&T phone support services, you need to provide an active AT&T phone number) and then talk about our phone instead. :-(
• pay $20 to open an Apple Care case

I was about ready to do the latter, but I gently suggested how unfair it was to make me pay when I had done everything by the books. They softened, opened a case for me, and asked me to call AppleCare with the case number. From there, I was in amazingly good hands. The AppleCare representative understood my problem, connecetd me to AT&T, who did some troubleshooting and declared all was approved and well at their end and the problem was at Apple's end, then passed me back to another AppleCare rep to whom I repeated the whole story again, who then passed me on to a Senior Engineer. This fellow assured me that he will be the last person I will need to talk to and that he will take care of the problem. I was given a direct phone number and an emai address. He promised to call back at a certain time, and he did. Things look good. I believe my phone might be unlocked soon.

Moral of the story: There are legit instances when an official unlock from AT&T does not go through. The conversation that needs to happen between AT&T and Apple once the unlock is approved sometimes never happens and your phone remains locked despite the approval. If you find yourself in this situation, do one or both of two things:

• put in another request with AT&T (if you can) and try Restoring again
• open an AppleCare case. It is worth it at $20. I was lucky and I didn't have to pay (but I had waited 5 months; your patience may not be that extensive). The service is effective and efficient.

My phone was finally successfully unlocked with AppleCare's help. Please see my post above for details.

Thank you Thingo75! This worked perfectly for me with both a 3GS and 4S that ATT agreed to unlock. Got the iTunes message on both phones.

I never received any email or text communication from ATT (one of the phones was already offline anyway), so I just waited about 40 hours from when I talked to them to make sure it had time to process - and then followed your procedure.

These instructions were a lifesaver - I had previously requested an unlock, but the instructions from the ATT rep were so bad, I wasn't even close to doing the right thing (didn't factory reset - just did a straight backup & restore from backup)

I received confirmation that my unlock had been processed a little over a week ago. Upon receiving confirmation I followed the steps listed in the email from At&t, but did not see a message in itunes confirming the unlock.

After reading this thread I decided to just continue restoring to factory settings. I also followed the other bit of advice about starting itunes before plugging in the phone. As mentioned, the first try a week ago did nothing. 2nd try, nothing. Third try, Whamo, I got that sweet, sweet message.....now if only I could get MMS to work on H20 without a jailbreak........... btw you don't need to unlock an att phone to switch to H20, but I didn't know that until after I'd already requested the unlock.

Thanks for the help!

Thanks, you helped me save a lot of time thanks again

Install a sim card from another carrier and if the phone works then it is unlocked.