How can I activate my iPhone once I enrolled it to Tello?
Your beloved iPhone won’t work even if you’ve just enrolled into Tello. What to do? What to do? 
Don’t worry! Tello.com and its Customer Service team are always here to help. Once you finished the bring your own phone process, you need to follow a few steps in order to wipe the old settings from your iPhone and activate the device into our network. These steps are available:
- in your online account My Tello >> Dashboard
- in our Help Center >> Device Activation section
- upon request from our friendly Customer Service team
- OR below, in this blog post ;)
Remember: You can keep the phone number you love or even get a new one from us
If you need a new SIM from Tello, you can order one online and follow the steps below after its delivery:
- Unpack the phone, plug it in, and leave it to charge fully. Do not turn it ON yet.
- Go to the Active SIM page in your online account.
- Complete the field(s) required and follow the online prompts.
- Wait for the website to confirm that the activation process has finished. This can take up to 20 minutes.
- Insert the new Tello GSM SIM and switch the fully charged phone ON. (see our SIM Installation Guide)
- Follow any on-screen prompts provided and your phone should start to automatically activate the Tello GSM service.
- If your phone does not activate automatically, please wait 30 minutes, then reboot your phone and try again. You can also manually activate your device by following these steps.
- Start calling, texting & surfing the web with Tello!
What are the APN settings?
Here are the APN (or access point name) settings you’ll need:
- activate your mobile Data / APN: wholesale
- activate your phone as a modem / APN: wholesale
You can always turn for help to our human Customer Support Team which will be happy to assist with any issue, so contact us via email, phone or chat. Happy savings, everyone!
So, follow the steps above, activate your iPhone and enjoy Tello!
Tello charges more taxes than any other provider that’s why I’m switching to other company this month,and the phones are extremelly expensive and old models too
Dear Marco,
We appreciate your feedback and we’ll do our best to offer more phone models at lower rates in the future.
Also, regarding the taxes, can you please explain what is the exact tax amount that is higher than other competitors? I can see you had to pay local taxes in value of $2.52 for a $29 order. The local & federal taxes consisted of: State Sales Tax, County Sales Tax, Federal Cost Recovery Charge, Federal Universal Service Fund & Fl Prepaid Wireless E911 Fee.
Please let us know which one of them is higher than expected as we’d really like to get to the bottom of this.
Thank you very much,
Michelle, on behalf of Tello.com team
i activated the phone with tello but still dont work
Hi Jon,
Please contact our 24/7 Live Customer Support for this issue, thanks!
It varies depending on your state and local area..I live in cheap and environmentally bad, low teacher pay NC so my tax is only $1.19 for $24, new with Tello today.
I have a question, do tello doesn’t have SIM card? Because I can’t anywhere, if I want to join tello do I need sim card because my phone is iPhone 5s gsm I use SIM card for t mobile.
Dear Tuan,
Unfortunately, if you have an iPhone 5 from T Mobile you can’t enroll it into Tello since this is a GSM phone and it doesn’t have CDMA capabilities.
In order to join Tello you need a CDMA device. You can either buy one from us or from any other seller, it’s your choice.
Please let us know if you need help with anything else.
Michelle,
On behalf of Tello.com
Hi, I’m trying to activate my iPhone to Tello and I ordered a SIM card but anytime I attempt to call or text it doesn’t permit me to call or text it says those are unavailable, so I tried downloading the app because maybe that would help but every attempt at logging in it tells me that my information is incorrect? Sos
Dear Rachael,
We’d love to help, but we can’t find any account in our system with this name or email address.
Can you please contact our Customer Service team by phone or email , I am sure they can help.
Michelle,
On behalf of Tello.com
How do you program the iPhone4s! I can send textes but not receive!
Dear Krisbelle,
We’d love to help and we tried calling you several times to see how we can investigate the situation presented.
Still, you never answered.
Please get back to us if you still encounter this issue.
Michelle
On behalf of Tello.com
I have iPhone 5 with Verizon, can I join with Tello?
Dear Minh,
You can bring into Tello any iPhone purchased through Apple stores, big box stores or carrier retail channels, enrolled in Verizon if it’s one of these models: 5S, 5C, 6, 6+, 6S, 6S+, SE, 7, 7 Plus.
Still, in order to be 100% sure you can join Tello, we need your phone’s ESN number. Or you can check by yourself on our Bring Your Phone page.
Michelle,
On behalf of Tello.com
I have an iphone4.
Under contract with ATT now. Hope to switch to Tello.
Please give me step by step instructions to know how to swap the plan to activate my phone so I can cancel/transfer from one provider to another.
Hello,
In order to be able to use your phone with Tello, you need a Sprint ready unlocked device that is free from contract and has no unpaid balance. Since Tello runs on a CDMA network, you can enroll into Tello only CDMA devices and GSM phones that have CDMA capabilities (eg. any iPhone model starting with iPhone 6 and above).
If you own a phone with these characteristics, you can visit our Bring Your Own Phone page, enter your ESN/IMEI/MEID code and the system will lead you through the enrollment process, if the phone is compatible. You can also buy a phone from our online shop and get a new Tello number before ending your contract with AT&T.
For any other questions, our customer service team is available 24/7.
Thank you!
I have an iPhone 6s Plus with a CDMA SIM card for sprint and I want to active a plan with tello, but can you give me step by step procedure.
Hello,
Thank you for contacting us! The first thing you need to do is check whether your phone is compatible with Tello. In order to do that, you can check its IMEI number on the Bring Your Own Phone page: https://tello.com/bring_your_own_phone. Or you could send the phone’s ESN number to our customer service team and they will check for you.
If your phone is compatible, you should create an account and choose the plan you want or the amount of Pay As You Go credit of your choice. You can then go through the Bring Your Own Phone process to port in. Once your phone is activated on Tello you’ll be able to start using the service.
For 24/7 professional assistance, you can always contact our Customer Service team.
Have a great day!
You’ve very helpfully explained how to activate an iPhone on Tello. What if I need to do the reverse, which is to temporarily enable my phone for usage on another service (in my case, a GSM-based service)? How would I clear from my phone the settings configured by the steps you outlined in this blog post? I’m presuming that once my temporary need for using the other service has ended, I can just repeat the steps described in this blog post and activate my phone for use on Tello again.
Hello,
Thanks for reaching out! Firstly, you should check to see if your phone supports GSM and if that is the case, it should be ok.
For more details, please contact our Customer Service and tell us what are your needs and plan regarding this switch, so we can properly advice since there are a lot of things to consider :).
Thanks!
Hello,
Does “Tello” work well in Marina Del Rey, CA? Your service
https://tello.com/coverage
shows yes.
But my iPhone 6S can’t even catch the signal! Am I do something wrong?
Hi Sergei,
Thanks for reaching out!
Sorry you’re having some bumps with the signal, please contact our Customer Service for more info on that.
Thanks!
I just got the sim card. After I finished step 1 and 2, there is still no signal bars, but there is a LTE sign on the right. The problem is it won’t get me connected to internet.
I’m about to buy an iphone 7 plus that’s open to any carrier. can i bring it to tello?
Michelle! Hello and please try to explain as best you can what the USER SETTINGS restriction(s) on the iPhone 4/4s means for that customer? Is it a bummer? What does it prevent, and how can it be gotten around? Thanks, Robert…..
Pardon me — “Reset Subscriber Settings” on iPhone 4…….Thank you!
Hello Robert,
This is what I could find on resetting subscriber settings on iPhones, although I’m not sure it works the same for your iPhone 4, but it’s worth a try.
Reset subscriber settings:
-Connect to a Wi-Fi network
-Tap the Phone and pull up the Keypad.
-Dial ##25327#
-Tap the green call button.
-When the Reset subscriber settings message appears, tap Dismiss.
-Once the Waiting for activation message appears, tap Dismiss.
-If the activation is successful, an iPhone has been activated message will appear, tap Dismiss.
-Your phone is now ready for use
Hope it works, thanks!
Once I have successfully done the reset and service update, how do I know if I am on Tello? The network identifier in the top left still says Sprint. Is that because you use their network?
Yes, that sounds right! You do see Sprint here and if everything is right you can check your usage on site or in our app – https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/my-tello/id1017228507?mt=8 – and see how much you have used and have left of your plan. For any more details or issues, please call our Customer Service, thanks! Happy to have you with us!
I just switch to Tello however I keep getting “no service” in the upper left corner so I can’t use the dail pad to activate my phone. When I try it say call failed. How should I go about activation? I have a iPhone 6s
Hi Kieona,
Thanks for reaching out!
Please see this article here on how to activate an iPhone once you enrolled it to Tello: https://blog.tello.com/news/how-can-i-activate-my-iphone-once-i-enrolled-it-to-tello/. If you still need assistance, don’t hesitate to contact our Customer Support and they’ll help you with this matter.
Hope it helps, thanks!
I did contact and speak directly with customer support and they were very kind and tried to assist me but after many attempts to get my iphone 6s plus up and running making calls. They gave up and finally came back and said there were some towers out in my area. I was calling her from another sprint phone. That made no since to me at all. Im still without a working phone.
Hello Carole,
Sorry to hear about this. Although I fully trust our Support Team, I advise you to give us another call and try setting it up again.
Finger crossed & all the best!
If I buy a refurbished unlocked iPhone 7, how would I set it up on tello?
Hi,
Is it true that I can’t activate my iPhone 6 on Tello if I don’t update to the latest version?
I’m currently on 12.4.4 and was told that I caan’t activate it unless I update it to the latest version (12.4.6).
Hi, Sarah,
I didn’t know about this particular situation, but did you try calling our Customer Support and asking them about it? Maybe they can help you through the activation process. Thanks and fingers crossed!
I did step 1 in activating but its been over an hour and it still says NO SERVICE on my iPhone 7. I need help I tried contacting tello but no one responded…
Sorry to hear that, we had some pretty busy days, but I’m sure you got to one of my colleagues until now. Hope everything is sorted out, thanks!