Should an Australian sim work in my phone?

[Anonymous]

Hi all,

I'm heading to Australia for a few weeks holiday and obviously use WhatsApp, Maps and such to organise things and get around. However, given that O2 want to charge an eye-watering sum to use my contract sim, I was thinking about taking the sim out and grabbing a local PAYG sim out there (£11 for 1GB of data vs £6/MB) to put in my phone.
Would this work, or would I have to unlock the phone?

Thanks,

Tim

[Glory1]

Hi @Anonymous.

In order to use a local Australian sim you will need to unlock your phone. Follow the guide in this link:
https://community.o2.co.uk/t5/How-to-guides/Unlocking-an-O2-phone-to-use-a-different-SIM-card/ba-p/1014131

Have a great holiday.

[MI5]

Your phone might already be unlocked so check it first by inserting a non o2 SIM card.

[Anonymous]

I did wonder if it was already @MI5, as I remember unbranded O2 phones being unlocked, but that was years ago.

I think I'm going to try an Australian sim, and if it doesn't work, I'll go down the unlocking process that @Glory1 linked to.

Thanks for the replies!

Tim

And yeah, hopefully it'll be a cracking holiday!

[MI5]

I'd try one from UK before you go.
Your holiday might be over before you get it unlocked if you wait until you get there

[Anonymous]

Too late! I'm already in Singapore (which is where the problem reared it's head as my info text arrived before one for UAE roaming - my transit airport was Dubai - and I got confused)! I'll chance my arm, and if not see what WiFi I can find.

[MI5]

Oooops
Enjoy your trip anyway

[gmarkj]

Did you get the phone directly from o2 @Anonymous?
If no then it might be unlocked already...

[jonsie]

What phone do you have? Unless you bought from Apple, if it's an iPhone it's very probably locked. If it's Android then if it's unbranded and you didn't buy from O2 them it's probably unlocked. 

[Anonymous]

Well, my phone is an Xperia XC, which was a Carphone Warehouse upgrade, so is more or less manufacturer spec.

I put in an Australian Vodafone PAYG sim, and apart from enduring an hour or so where it set everything up, the phone works fine. Hopefully this will be of some use to other people in a similar boat!

Tim