iPhone 6s carrier interchangeable?

[lopri]

I was looking at iPhone 6s Plus @Swappa, and they are sold under separate category per carrier. (e.g. T-Mobile iPhone 6s, Verizon iPhone 6s Plus, and so on)

Are they locked to respective carriers' network? I thought the 6s/6s Plus are basically unlocked for all carriers. I also assumed the phones people are selling are fully paid for, thus even if the phones were initially tied to the networks they should be eligible for SIM unlock without hassle. And the sellers would presumably do that before they list the phones to increase the value of their offers.

Am I missing something? As far as I know there are only two different hardware, one supporting band 30(?) and one not supporting. Other than one model unable to take advantage of that band, is there any barrier to buy a Sprint-issued iPhone 6s and to use it on AT&T's network?

 

[ViRGE]

The answer is more a carrier answer than a technical answer. The best reference I know is the following PC Magazine article

For the record, Verizon phones are unlocked if purchased at full price. T-Mobile iPhones are unlocked if purchased at full price directly from Apple (as opposed to from T-Mobile.) AT&T and Sprint phones are not unlocked by default. All the carriers will unlock your phone once you've signed up for service and used it for a certain amount of time, which varies by carrier and plan, but you do have to sign up for service. You can't get an iPhone without service from Apple right now.

So some of these phones may be locked if the owners have skipped out on payments or just haven't bothered to get it unlocked if it shipped locked. One would think you'd get your phone unlocked before selling it, but people are lazy.

Anyhow, no, there's no reason you can't use a Sprint 6s on AT&T so long as it's been unlocked. You miss out on LTE band 30, but it's not the end of the world.

BTW, Sprint's unlocking policy. Sprint automatically unlocks after 50 days as long as an account is in good standing. And that's always the rub, you can't tell if someone is selling you a phone tied to an unpaid account.

 

[Oyeve]

In my experience all Verizon iphones are unlocked without having to go to the carrier. TMO iphones need to be unlocked. Again, this has been my experience.