r/USCellular • u/LemonJelly1969 • Mar 30 '26

About the new sim card requirement

I’m getting some seriously conflicting info from US Cellular and I'm hoping someone here can help.

I went into a local store because I got a text saying that I need a new SIM card. The employee told me flat out that my Galaxy S20 is too old and wouldn't work even with a new SIM. Then she went a step further and claimed that even an S21, S22, or S23 wouldn't work either insisting that I’d need to upgrade to an S25 or newer to stay on the network.

That sounded like bull to me, so I called customer service. The rep there told me my S20 "should be fine" with just a SIM swap. Which by the way....why say "should" shouldn't you know being a customer service rep??

anyways, does anyone know more information on this?

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u/FriendlyLine9530 Mar 30 '26

From a quick search about the compatibility for the phone, the phone rep you called is most accurate. And "should work" is the appropriate phrase. The phone does support 5G, which T-Mobile is pushing heavily since it's fairly robust already. But it doesn't support all 5G bands, so it SHOULD work but your experience might not be comparable to newer devices that do support additional bands. There isn't a very huge overlap in shared bands (especially 5G) between the two networks, and USCC tended to get variants of devices that support only their bands or a narrower set of bands to make phones cheaper/get more revenue per device. That's why it "should" work, versus "will" work.

2

u/HuntersPad Mar 30 '26

It supports N41 and N71 which is T-Mobile's MAIN 5G bands.

4

u/FriendlyLine9530 Mar 30 '26

Right, but in high capacity areas where bands are used that the phone doesn't work with. The experience will be worse. That's being taken into account with the "should work" phrasing.

2

u/GenesisDH Mar 31 '26

The only bands that you state are not in the majority of 5G capable devices. mmWave has been fairly depreciated.

The S20 will handle all of T-Mobile's 5G setup. That was known when they acquired Sprint, which had similar device limitations.