How to Factory Unlock Your Off-Contract AT&T iPhone

The beloved screen you want to see in iTunes, signifying a successful iPhone unlock

I served my time and lived out the contract on my iPhone 4S and I wanted a factory unlock.  I intended to take the phone to Straight Talk and save money.  Here’s how you can unlock your iPhone that’s on AT&T, and assuming you still are an AT&T subscriber…

Step 1: Look up your IMEI number on your iPhone.  You can get this by running “Settings” on your iPhone.  Tap on “General.”

iPhone Settings App

Tap on General.

Settings > General

Tap on “About”

Settings > General > About

Scroll down to see your IMEI number:

Settings > General > About > scroll down to see your IMEI number

Note: you can also look up you IMEI number on the sim tray of your iPhone.  Using a paperclip, insert it in the hole of the sim tray on your iphone to eject the tray.  Look on the back side.  You may need a magnifying glass if you don’t have good eyes:

iPhone 4S SIM tray

iPhone 3G/3GS SIM tray

Step 2: In your favorite web browser to to AT&T’s Device Unlock Portal: https://www.att.com/deviceunlock/client/en_US/termsAndCondition

AT&T’s Device Unlock Portal

Select the radio button for whether you are a Current, Previous, or GoPhone customer.  Then (if you were an AT&T customer like me) enter your wireless number, IMEI Number, First Name, Last name, Email Address, Last 4 digits of your SSN, and your AT&T Passcode and click “Submit.”  The screen you see after submitting will give you a Request number and will look like this:

Device Unlock Request successfully submitted screen

You should save the 7-digit request number on the page above because you can use it to look up the status of your request.  You should receive an email indicating your request shortly that has that number on it as well though.  It will look something like this:

Device Unlock Request Received Email Confirmation

Step 3:  Wait for an email from AT&T signifying a successful unlock.  You can check on the status of your request by visiting AT&T’s Device Unlock Status Portal that is given in your confirmation email: https://www.att.com/deviceunlockstatus/  With your Unlock request number and your IMEI number you can see how things are going there:

AT&T’s Device Unlock Request Status check page

Here’s the beloved successful unlocking email:

AT&T Successful Unlock Qualification Email

Step 4: Restore or Reinstall iOS on your iPhone to realize the unlock.  If you have already synced your iPhone to your computer you should sync and then to a restore from backup.  If it is a new iPhone to you then you can either update iOS or do a restore.  If the unlocking is successful, you will see the following screen in iTunes upon the successful restore:

This is the goal 🙂 Other useful links:   Apple Support Site— iPhone: Wireless carrier support and features Makeuseof: Everything You Need To Know About Unlocking iPhones