Switching From Net10 Wireless To Straight Talk Wireless

A reader,Ephier , asks…

I have a Verizon iPhone 5c with Net10. I have 2.5 GB of LTE for $50 and the coverage in my area is great. The only real complain is that for the life of me I can’t get the MMS working, even with the SIM swap. I been thinking of transferring over to Straight Talk though since they offer 3 GB of data for 45. So my questions are whether the transfer to Straight Talk is worth it? Will I lose my LTE? There is no near Walmart in my area, so can I reup online? Basically, what will be the pros and cons if I switch? Thanks

Hi Ephier,

Switching from Net10 Wireless to Straight Talk Wireless might solve your problem, but not in the way you think.

Both Straight Talk and Net10 Wireless are both owned by the same company, America Movil. While the plans each company offers are a little different, the service is identical. the Straight Talk brand was created as an exclusive for Walmart. Target, Radio Shack, and a number of other retailers offer Net10 Wireless but Straight Talk is only available through Walmart and online.

You should still get LTE, if you are getting it with Net10. If you use prepaid cards, you can only buy them at Walmart, while Net10 cards are available at a number of retail locations. When you re-up online, you will pay both state sales tax but also pay  a 911 Service charge,  Federal Universal Service, and Regulatory Cost Recovery which for me was about $1.60 last I checked.

If you change to Straight Talk your APN settings will change and that might fix your MMS issues, it might just start working. Mine does, all our iPhones using Straight Talk and Net10 here work without SIM swap or having to install the APN profile. I think you could solve your problem by replacing your Net10 SIM with a new one. When you do this, your APN settings will change and your MMS should just start working.

I looked through the comments. You have been here before. I asked you to go to http://www.net10.com/byop_apn/index.jsp  and check your APN settings and you replied that they were

APN: wap.tracfone
PROXY: att2.tracfone.com
PORT: 80
MMSC: http://mmsc.cingular.com
MMS PROXY: att2.tracfone.com
MMS PORT: 80
MMS_APN: wap.tracfone

So here is the issue. You used to be able to SIM swap and change your APN settings. This was a work around. It does not seem to work with iOS 7.1. It did with 7.0.

When you put your Net10 SIM in your iPhone, the phone sets the APN for the Net10 tfdata APN automatically, not wap.tracfone. If you transfer your service from your current SIM to a new SIM, your APN should change to tfdata and your phone should work. Transferring your service to a new SIM is fast and easy, easier than switching to Straight Talk.

It’s worth the cost of a new SIM to try, you can order a new nano SIM from the Net10 website.

I hope this helps, let me know if you have more questions.

Comments are closed.