Buying iPhone 5 in the US and bringing to Europe: success.
Hi,
In case any of you is wondering about iPhone 5 models and whether they work in Europe if bought in the US, I would like to share my successful experience:
- You can buy a Verizon unlocked phone in an Apple Store in the US. Be prepared for the Apple Store person to be a little confused and ignore the "but that is not GSM" or "CDMA does not work in Europe".
- Check and make sure that it is model A1429. Further check that it is a Verizon model [1]. This can be done by parsing one of the ends of the box with all the barcodes without having to open the plastic.
- Not sure this makes a difference, but I replaced the stock Verizon SIM with my European SIM before activating in iTunes. <- Is this really needed?
- The phone works with my European SIM in the US, UK, FR, and CH.
- 3G works without a hitch and the rates are much better than in the iPhone 3G.
- Enjoy a >10% discount on a fully unlocked phone.
I have not yet tested LTE. From the table at http://www.apple.com/iphone/LTE/ the Verizon A1429 model supports a superset of the bands supported by the European A1429 model.
Feedback on point 3 and your experiences with LTE are welcome!
[1] Verizon 16 GB, 32 GB, and 64 GB models in black are MD654LL/A, MD658LL/A, and MD664LL/A. The white 16 GB, 32 GB, and 64 GB models are MD655LL/A, MD659LL/A, and MD665LL/A.
iPhone 5, iOS 6.1