Do you really want an iPhone on prepaid?

Follow the logic here, and feel free to chime in where it is flawed. You go into the Apple store, and buy your iPhone 3G for $199, and sign up for a tw-year deal. You take it home, play with it for 30 days, and then cancel your service. You can’t cancel it before that, lest you’re forced to return the iPhone 3G. And we don’t want that. So now you’ve paid $369, and you’ve got an iPhone without a contract. And that’s still cheaper than the original iPhone was selling for. While it’s not guaranteed to work, you could then theoretically activate it on GoPhone’s data only plan for $20 per month. Of course, AT&T would know about your tricks and would likely stop you in your tracks. But hey, it’s worth a shot, right?]]>

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11 Comments

  1. Christopher Price on July 11, 2008 at 11:20 am

    Actually, there’s one catch you’re missing. Just because you have an iPhone 3G free and clear of a contract, doesn’t mean it will work on prepaid.
    For that, you may have to wait for someone to make a jailbreak. It remains to be seen, as iPhone 3G units are still bricked due to an Apple server failure this morning…
    But, stay tuned to PhoneNews.com. As soon as we figure out how to make iPhone 3G work on prepaid, we’ll post away.



  2. Ben on July 11, 2008 at 3:40 pm

    There is another thing you are missing – You also have to pay for that month of service (minimum $70) + $36 activation…. so make that $480 or so…



  3. Christopher Price on July 12, 2008 at 9:43 pm

    Update: Yes, iPhone 3G does work out-of-the-box with prepaid. Check PhoneNews.com for all the details.



  4. nancy on July 21, 2008 at 12:38 am

    did this work?? has anyone tried this?!!?



  5. Natasha on August 28, 2008 at 8:52 pm

    well if you look like a person that doesn’t know anything about electronics you can try that cuz people who don;t look suspisious might not get caught



  6. ahmed on December 14, 2008 at 10:46 am

    so now i know that iphone 3g works on prepaid. but i have a MAJOR question will the iphone 3g still be able to use att’s 3g network even as a go phone, please answer i’m lookin to buy one and unlock it for tmobile. otherwise this is my only hope. becuase if i unlock it for tmobile it will only work on edge, PLEASE REPLY!!!!!



  7. Joe on December 15, 2008 at 9:51 am

    I can’t say for sure, ahmed, but there seems to be no reason the iPhone 3G wouldn’t be able to use 3G on prepaid. AT&T offers a number of 3G prepaid phones.



  8. ahmed on December 15, 2008 at 10:46 pm

    so if i get the iphone 3g prepaid i will be able to use its 3g without contract?



  9. Holly on October 7, 2009 at 11:15 pm

    I really want to get someone a iphone for Christmas but i want it to be prepaid and i want it to have internet on it were can i find one like that at?



  10. Brian on November 9, 2009 at 11:47 pm

    Ya, if you could find a iphone somehow, buy one maybe on ebay or something, you could go to the store and buy one of those Cingular Pay as You Go phones and activate it, then take the sim card out of that phone and put it in the iphone. should work for you.



  11. gus on December 1, 2009 at 12:51 am

    i just spoke to apple and att reps on the phone for over an hour on trying to activate my iphone on my prepaid account that i’ve had now for a few years and att told me that they no longer support activations on a prepaid account to an iphone since July of this year (2009). I guess that means I got jailbreak it and unlock it to work with my prepaid account.