Esim support for local Thai sim card?

[abidismaili]

Everytime when I arrive I buy a local sim card at the airport. Do you know if it is now possible that this local card is a esim? iPhones use esim for dual SIM support. 

[TotallyOz]

I have not heard of this so I'll be curious. Normally, the esim comes programmed into the phone or at least mine with. I have a Google Pixel 3XL and it was sent to me via Google and had the esim inside and I also use my Thai Sim card so it is dual for me.

[DivineMadman]

I have an AIS eSim on my phone (an iPhone).  I don't know if it's an option for someone arriving at the airport.  I had been using the regular SIM card and went into an an AIS shop and asked them to set up the eSim for me, which they graciously did at no cost.  (Recommended:  the nice AIS shop in Central World)

My main long-time U.S. phone number for friends, family and banks is the regular SIM card.  This set up makes sense for me I think only because I use google fi, which has data at the same rate pretty much everywhere, and was less than half of what I was paying in the U.S. for AT&T; therefore, net-net I'm still saving money even though I no longer get inexpensive local SIM cards when traveling to, say Indonesia or Vietnam.   But it's still a bit ass-backwards - logically my "main" number would be the eSIM and swap out the physical SIM when traveling.  

[spoon]

I thought the beauty of esim is you dont need the physical simcard if carriers that you want to use their services does allow esim. Meaning u can easily switch from your US esim to AIS esim just by selecting them in the setting, thus eliminating physical sim card. Of course not all carriers already adopted esim so all phone will still have physcial simcard. 

[DivineMadman]

2 hours ago, spoon said:

I thought the beauty of esim is you dont need the physical simcard if carriers that you want to use their services does allow esim. Meaning u can easily switch from your US esim to AIS esim just by selecting them in the setting, thus eliminating physical sim card. 

I think the situation Michael and I were referring to is the use of the "dual SIM" technology so your phone has two active phone lines at the same time. 

[TotallyOz]

I do think technologically the components are there, but no one is using it. I see this as the way of the future. For now, I want to see others do this and report back.

[Jasper]

On 10/14/2019 at 10:34 PM, abidismaili said:

Everytime when I arrive I buy a local sim card at the airport. Do you know if it is now possible that this local card is a esim? iPhones use esim for dual SIM support. 

Yesterday, I successfully converted a tourist sim card which I bought at AIS shop at Suvarnabhumi airport to an eSim.

I bought the SIM card 2 years ago, put it into my old iPhone and kept the same AIS telephone number by topping up, each 20 baht top up extend for a month.

I went to Paragon AIS shop, they have English speaking service staff by the way and asked if my current prepaid tourist sim can be converted to eSim. He asked my current AIS number and typed a few details print out QR code, scanned it by my iPhone XS Max, and that’s it.

My only concern was they do it only for monthly contract which requires work permit etc. but not for a prepaid tourist SIM card.

My iPhone now has 2 active telephone lines.

1.physical SIM card for my home country

2. AIS eSim

Since it’s a prepaid number, not a monthly contract, I only bought 15 days data packet which cost 99 baht so the next time my holidays comes, I need to buy an another data packet for a duration of my holiday.

 

https://www.ais.co.th/iphone/en/dualsim.html

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT209044

 

[abidismaili]

You would think this QR code method should also work at the airport. If I were to buy it now at the airport can they also do the esim QR code option from there you think? In 4 weeks I am travelling again to Thailand and buying again a local sim

I didn't know you could keep your local sim. How do you too it up by the way? You have a local Thai bank account?

[Jasper]

2 hours ago, abidismaili said:

I didn't know you could keep your local sim. How do you too it up by the way? You have a local Thai bank account?

I don’t have a local Thai bank account.

You can top up by cash, each 20 baht top up extend one month.

When I bought a tourist sim I was told it will expire after one year but it’s isn’t true.

There are self kiosk machines in  AIS shop front and other places. You can choose English language option. The machine takes cash and it’s minimum top up is 20baht so if you pay 20 baht X 12 times, 240 baht  you can extend expiry date by one year.

I don’t see any reason why they don’t do eSim at airport.