Many of us cannot tolerate classic physical SIM cards in the nano size, and the so-called eSIM (alias embedded-SIM) has left them completely cold in recent years. Partly because there was a lack of greater support and “willingness” from mobile manufacturers, as eSIM is only offered by the most expensive smartphones and watches of a few brands. In addition, it is possible that by the time users “rock” and want to switch to eSIM, this will no longer be possible. Qualcomm has big plans – by 2027, it expects that there will be up to 300 million smartphones on the market with support for the iSIM format.
The iSIM (or Integrated SIM) format itself has been with us since 2018, but the first commercial deployment took place only last year in January. And while eSIM needs a separate processor, iSIM integrates the SIM card directly into the chipset. It may sound a bit far-fetched, but by switching to iSIM, Qualcomm promises manufacturers in particular more space inside phones (in reality it will be a few square millimeters) or easy integration into wearables and IoT devices, where every bit of free space really matters.
A brief history of SIM cards since 1996
A secondary advantage is also greater security of stored cards. The slow transition to iSIM will begin this year as Qualcomm has confirmed that it has received successful certification for iSIM in the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset from the GSMA. It develops and implements standards for mobile connectivity, and the “GSMA security certification2” certification indicates that the iSIM standard is at least as secure as eSIM. However, adding iSIM cards to smartphones should be completely identical to the current eSIM. Of course, this will also require the cooperation of the operators, and even that will probably take a few more years.
In four years, there are expected to be 300 million iSIM-enabled smartphones on the market, which would correspond to 19 percent of global shipments of eSIM phones. According to Thales, which worked with Qualcomm to develop the iSIM, the eSIM was just the beginning of a journey where smartphones will completely do away with the plastic cards with phone numbers that have been with us since 1996.
Vodafone explains the benefits of iSIM:
Source Qualcomm
