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Hello, my mother in law is visiting from the Caribbean. She has decided she would like to upgrade phones while state side. Looks like it’s gonna be a IPhone 14 or 14 pro. I see that best buy has some deals for unlocked. Wanted to touch base here and verify if those are truly fully unlocked. I don’t want to send her back home only to find out it wasn’t internationally unlocked
I am wanting to quickly (would like to have phone within a week) an unlocked phone with no plan, not even a monthly plan. (I have a separate through about SIM cards but this is about the phone itself). Looking for ideas where to buy unlocked phone without having to sign up for any kind of monthly plan.
I was looking on Best Buy (who had a couple of the Samsung A series phones I am interested in) and they are unlocked but it appears they only sell them on a contract or for a specific carrier.
This phone is going to be a spare, mostly for travel. So I want to be able to buy SIMs for a specific amount of minutes, texts, data and also to switch to one for another country as needed. The Samsung A series looks adequate (likely the A36 or A26) but am totally willing to consider other options.
But where to get the phone? I don't want to have one of the month to month plan. Just buy as needed. One reason I don't any plan with a carrier is that the phone will be used on a cruise and I don't want to have any possibility at all that the person using the phone could come home to a big bill if someone accidentally it connected to ship cellular.
I think I can buy direct from Samsung and could get it quick enough. But I am not necessarily wedded to Samsung. Ideally would like to be able to buy the phone in person but not absolutely required. Will not buy from Amazon (the phone -- could buy SIM from there).
EDIT: Ordered A26 from Samsung which arrived today. Thanks for all the responses.
I've been wanting to purchase the Pixel 6 Pro for a while and I think I'm ready to pull the trigger. I'd like to buy it unlocked but the Google Pixel sub is full of people's phones getting stolen in transit with no recourse from Google. I noticed this evening that I can buy it unlocked from Best Buy apparently. Is there any downside to this? It's sold through Best Buy and gives the options of through a carrier or unlocked, and there are separate open box and marketplace listings, so I'm assuming that I can actually purchase it new through Best Buy directly in a legit manner.
Any thoughts or other suggestions of places I can purchase this thing? I feel like buying unlocked devices in Canada is such a hassle. Thanks!
Edit to add: yes I know not to buy from marketplace listings!!