Best Cheapie, Dual Physical Sim Back up Phone

Mugsy on 18/07/2024 - 09:35
Last edited 18/07/2024 - 09:40

In a unforeseen turn of events, my parents are looking at getting a chinese sim card so that they have a permanent chinese mobile number for their future trips to China.

Both of the new phones Dad has gotten recently have only one physical sim and one esim. Dad has two services with Amaysim and he prefers to keep these as physical sims (when it comes time to change phones he wants to be able to do it himself so dicking around with transferring esims is out of the question). We can also see situations where he will need both his secondary amaysim number and the chinese mobile number active at the same time.

I'm thinking it might be best to replace his Moto G54 (the secondary phone) with another phone that can take two physical sims since he only needs one phone with an esim.

Any suggestions on what is the best budget phone with dual physical sims? Happy to consider mid range phones under $500 if it has a much better camera.

Mobile Mobile Phone

Comments

  • jeffui on 18/07/2024 - 10:39
    +1

    I was looking into this recently as well. Needed to get a Sim solely for work and don't want to carry multiple phones.

    I've got my eyes on the Motorola G84, which I believe takes 2 nano Sims. It has gone on sale couple of times in June - July, which in these instances I've missed the boat. It dropped to below $300, and OW had them for $297 when price matched.

    Samsung ones were on the expensive side.

    I would like to hear suggestions from Ozbargainers too.

    • Mugsy on 18/07/2024 - 19:53

      Cheers mate. The G84 was the first phone that came to mind for me but at $300 that's getting towards mid range territory and I'd be more inclined to get a phone with a better camera.

  • freefall101 on 18/07/2024 - 11:14

    https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/857165 - this if they don't need NFC.

    The whole redmi 13 series have dual sim too.

    • Mugsy on 18/07/2024 - 19:55
      +1

      I haven't looked at Redmi much. I know Oppo a bit better. I assume they don't have 4yrs of updates/5yrs security updates like Samsung have… though they could have the better camera. I'll do some research.

      The Nothing phones seem nice and cashless payments in China is based on QR code scanning so NFC currently isn't as important… but could be in the future. Probably best I future proof the purchase a bit.

  • shxhshzhz on 18/07/2024 - 11:34

    https://www.harveynorman.com.au/moto-g84-5g-256gb.html $330 after price beat

    https://www.jbhifi.com.au/products/samsung-galaxy-a25-5g-128… $328 with Perks, dual sim and updates up to Android 18 and security updates until December 2028 (4.5 years of support left)

    • Mugsy on 18/07/2024 - 19:59

      Dad's main phone is currently a Samsung A55… he's only started using it yesterday so I might have to see how he likes Samsung.

      The only thing about the A25 that annoys me is that the second sim slot doubles as a microSD slot so Dad can't have both. But I'll put it on the shortlist.

      • shxhshzhz on 19/07/2024 - 01:07

        If it's just a spare phone, the TCL 50 SE is enough for normal use. It has 2 sims and microSD. Very cheap phone, $216 or $203.40 with Plus.

        • Mugsy on 19/07/2024 - 07:34

          Cheers. Will take a look.

          If they do phones half as good as they do TVs, it should hopefully be decent.

          But your comment about it being a spare phone got me thinking… my folks spend half the year abroad and if they're sticking to China more, that could be half the year they spend there. Dad could end up using this phone quite a bit.

  • DashCam AKA Rolts on 18/07/2024 - 15:04

    Here you go. https://www.mobileciti.com.au/mobile-phones/dual-sim-phones

    Check your parents' Moto G54. Some variants of that model take 2 physical sims.

    • Mugsy on 18/07/2024 - 20:18

      The G54 definitely has an esim… I bought the phone for Dad and I ensured that it was an esim version (the dual physical sim version isn't officially sold here… those ones are grey imports).

      At the time, the G54 was to solely be for travel purposes so that Dad could install a travel esim on it and hotspot to his and mum's other phones.

      But over the past few weeks, both of Dad's main and secondary phones started having serious issues. We replaced his main phone with the Samsung A55 for the extra years of updates, and so Dad also had an esim on his main phone where he does his banking and uses whatsapp.

      I originally thought we could just use the Moto G54 as Dad's secondary phone… and then he threw the matter of a Chinese sim into the equation. Really wish they had said that earlier. I would have considered a completely different phone to the Samsung A55

  • koplik8 on 19/07/2024 - 13:06

    I've got the Oppo Reno11. It's a great phone. Good screen size too

    • Mugsy on 19/07/2024 - 13:40

      I had a look at this (the F variant at least) as I use to own the Reno2 Z which, at the time, the camera was a good step up compared to other mid range phones. Not sure that's the case these days if the following comparison is reliable:

      https://versus.com/en/motorola-moto-g84-5g-vs-oppo-reno11-f

      JB has it at $599 atm… not sure how cheap it goes when on sale but I'll be keeping an eye on this. If it's cheap enough, I may consider this as Dad's second phone is an Oppo A53s and I think he's pretty happy with how Oppos have performed, especially when used in China.

      Need to find out how many years of updates the Reno11 F will get as well. (EDIT: could be 3yrs OS updates… 4yrs security updates. I could only find this on an Indian website… hopefully this applies to AU too. The 67W charger is nice though)

  • shxhshzhz on 25/07/2024 - 00:07

    @Mugsy G84 is on sale. $282 from Mobileciti using MCJUL5

    • Mugsy on 25/07/2024 - 07:49

      Cheers bud.

      We're probably gonna put a hold on changing Dad's second phone until after his next holiday to China.

      They depart in less than a month and I don't have time to migrate Dad's wechat account to a new phone.

      I also want to see how Dad finds his new Samsung A55's camera. If he needs some zoom, I may have to factor that into the specs for his second phone which would rule out the G84.

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