Owners of T-Mobile Samsung phones are having a field day after discovering a glitch
When you purchase a smartphone through a carrier, it's locked to that company's network. To use the device with another carrier, it must be unlocked first. All carriers have different requirements for unlocking devices. In the case of T-Mobile, a phone must have been active on its network for at least 40 days before a request to unlock is made and in case it was financed through the carrier, it must be paid in full.
None of those stipulations apply at the moment if you are on T-Mobile and have a Samsung phone, per The Mobile Report.
Carriers have a simple and understandable reason for locking phones. If they let you snag a phone at a discounted price, they want you to stay with them for a predetermined period. That doesn't make carrier locks any less annoying though.
Some Samsung users have discovered that their phones can be unlocked easily, even if the devices have not been paid off. All you have to do is go to the Settings app, tap on Connections, navigate to More Connection Settings, and then open Network Unlock. After that, you should ask for a Temporary Unlock, and after a short wait, tap on Permanent Unlock, and ta-da, your phone will be unlocked.
At this point, it's not exactly known whether it's a glitch or T-Mobile has already started accommodating consumer advocates' demand for a shorter unlocking period as a prerequisite for allowing Mint Mobile acquisition.
After all, consumers have been able to unlock phones on their own since at least August, so it seems unlikely that T-Mobile is not aware of this loophole. That said, even though this sounds intentional, since there is no official confirmation, you should go this route at your own risk.
One floating theory is that Samsung's One UI software has a bug that auto-approve unlocks if a device is on T-Mobile.
According to the report, users have so far been able to unlock the Galaxy S4, Galaxy S23, Galaxy Z Fold models, and Z Flip devices.
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