How to Buy an iPhone

Currently you can buy an iPhone in only three places:

Apple stores: Apple retail stores can be found in most major cities and many malls around the country. You can find a list of stores at www.apple.com/retail.
AT&T corporate stores: You can locate an AT&T store at www.wireless.att.com/find-a-store/iphone. Only AT&T corporate stores carry iPhones; authorized AT&T resellers do not.
Apple online store: You can also buy an iPhone direct from Apple online at store.apple.com.

iPhone Rate Plans

When Apple released the iPhone in July 2007, it made a multiyear deal with AT&T to be the exclusive cellular service carrier. Though it’s possible to “unlock” an iPhone so it can work on another network, it takes some technical know-how to do so, and besides, Apple frowns upon the practice and won’t provide any support for an unlocked iPhone.

Most people do not try to unlock their iPhones. If you don’t unlock your iPhone and currently have a cellular contract with a carrier other than AT&T (such as T-Mobile, Sprint, or Verizon), you either have to wait until the term of your existing contract is over, or terminate the contract and pay the termination fee.

When you buy an iPhone, you must sign up for a two-year contract with AT&T for one of AT&T’s iPhone rate plans. All plans come with unlimited data streaming, the service you need to connect your iPhone to the internet over AT&T’s data network to send and receive emails or surf the web. The following table details the most popular plans:

Features	$59.99	$79.99	$99.99
Minutes	450	900	1,350
Unlimited data (email/web)	Yes	Yes	Yes
Visual voicemail	Yes	Yes	Yes
SMS text messages	200	200	200
Nights and weekends	5,000	Unlimited	Unlimited
Rollover minutes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Unlimited mobile-to-mobile (between AT&T customers)	Yes	Yes	Yes