Will old mobile phones work?

[ericmark]

Daughter's phone has failed, loads of phones knocking around the house, but the SIM card size has changed, so can't test them, no point getting a replacement SIM card if phone will no longer work, so will an old Nokia phone still work, battery tested and OK, found the charger, but is the network still there?

 

[Jurassicspark]

As far as I'm aware, these older phones had a standard sim size, and sim sizes came in standard, micro and nano.

So you can find an adapter for the sim card, and that should work fine.

Now here is where the tricky part comes into play.

Some, older, Nokia phones only supported 2G, and I think 2G is not supported anymore, so the phone may not work for calls and texts.

However, some Nokia phones do support 3G, or even 4G, and this has a higher chance of working.

So it might work.

I don't know.

 

[Mottie]

2G will be switched off in 2033 so 2G phones should still work nowdays. You just need an adaptor to fit the sim and the phone.

 

[securespark]

O2 plan a phased 2G shutdown from 25-33.
EE will switch off 2G in May 29.
Vodafone will knock theirs off in 30.
3 don't have any 2G spectrum and have already switched off their 3G, along with Vodafone.
O2 will switch off 3G at the end of 25.
EE switched off 3G in Feb 24.

 

[StephenStephen]

Mine still works for calls and texts...

 

[JohnD]

I have a 20 year old Motorola carphone that still works.

I put a modern SIM into it using the plastic adaptor.

I have a couple of other quite old phones as spares, I put a PAYG SIM in and lend them to visitors from foreign parts.
ASDA SIMs, which use EE network. We have one with an expired Tesco contract SIM that still receives incoming calls and texts.

I send a text to them once a month to keep them live.

Pardon our interruption...

 

[johnny2007]

Tried my Vodafone and my daughter Lebara SIM cards in an old brick phone and they don't get any signal.

 

[JohnD]

Daughter's phone has failed, loads of phones knocking around the house, but the SIM card size has changed, so can't test them, no point getting a replacement SIM card if phone will no longer work, so will an old Nokia phone still work, battery tested and OK, found the charger, but is the network still there?

Looks like the answer is, try it and see.

 

[ericmark]

Thank you all, seems my daughter does not want a phone which will not work with Whatsapp, so not interested in my old phones.