If you ever find yourself buying a Pixel 3 and you intend to use it on a carrier that isn’t Verizon, you’ll probably want to ensure it was purchased from the Google Store.Īs for unlocking the Verizon Pixel 3 for other networks, well, there’s a distinct lack of information around that. Verizon Pixel 3 devices will have to be unlocked to support other networks, which could end up with some interesting situations down the road.

However, it does put up a couple of red flags for the future, especially when it comes to reselling these phones. Like I mentioned earlier, this isn’t going to be much of a problem for the vast majority of Pixel buyers. When booting up and inserting a SIM card from AT&T or T-Mobile, which the phone technically supports, a message pops up that says the “SIM card isn’t supported” (see image below, via Android Central). This time, though, some of those users are finding that their device is actually SIM-locked to Verizon. For users who missed out on early shipping through the Google Store or preferred to buy their device in-store and/or with a Best Buy credit card, that brick-and-mortar store was the place to go for a Pixel device for the past couple of years. However, Best Buy has been selling the Verizon Pixel 3 at its retail price, in some cases even without the buyer having a Verizon account. Buying a Pixel 3 directly from Verizon means you’re probably a Verizon customer who intends to use the phone there for the foreseeable future.

Now, though, the carrier is changing those rules, and that means that the Verizon Pixel 3 is locked down to the Big Red.įirst and foremost, why is this such a big deal? For most customers, it won’t be. That means that a Verizon phone can work on basically any other network even if you bought it directly from the carrier. For the better part of the last decade, Verizon’s smartphones haven’t been SIM-locked.

Sim card locked verizon