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How and When Can I Upgrade My AT&T Wireless Phone?

In a nutshell: If you're like a lot of other people, you like to keep up with the latest phone technology, upgrading your device whenever you can to make sure you always have cutting edge technology. If you got your phone through AT&T then you'll find the upgrade process pretty easy to dom However, you will have to make sure you qualify for an upgrade.

Introduction

If you're like a lot of other people, you like to keep up with the latest phone technology, upgrading your device whenever you can to make sure you always have cutting edge technology. If you got your phone through AT&T then you'll find the upgrade process pretty easy to dom However, you will have to make sure you qualify for an upgrade.

What You'll Need

Do I Qualify for an Upgrade?

If you own the phone entirely, you qualify for an upgrade. If you are on the regular installment plan, your only option is to fully pay your phone off before you upgrade to a new one. If you have the AT&T Next Up installment plan, you only need to have paid off half of the amount you owe before you can upgrade your phone.

If you have an AT&T plan that you want to keep but AT&T doesn't offer the plan anymore, don't worry. You can still upgrade your phone. AT&T will let you continue using that plan on your new phone. However, keeping an older plan may disqualify you from any upgrade promotions the company is offering.

Go to the AT&T sign in page and enter the required information to sign into your account.

AT&T sign in page

Turn off Wireless Account Lock, if you have it on.

You can't upgrade your phone with Wireless Account Lock turned on. To turn it off, open the myAT&T app, which is the only way to turn it off or on. Select the Services tab. Choose Mobile security, then Wireless Account Lock, then Continue. Choose the account you want to unlock, if you have more than one account. Select the unlock option.

Go to the AT&T upgrade now page.

AT&T upgrade now page

Find the device you want to upgrade in the list of devices.

Select the start upgrade option.

Note: even if you are on the regular installment plan and haven't fully paid off the phone, you can still get an upgrade, just as long as you pay off your remaining balance on your current phone at the time of checkout. To pay it off, all you need to do is start the upgrade process. Your current remaining balance will be added to the amount due at checkout.

Select a new phone to upgrade to.

Follow the prompts to complete the checkout process.

Upgrade your phone on the myAT&T app.

In the app, select the Device tab, locate the phone you want to upgrade, and select it. Follow the prompts to complete the process.

Conclusion

If you qualify for an upgrade, you can upgrade to any new phone you want without restriction. The whole process should only take about five minutes to complete, unless you take a long time making up your mind about which new phone you want.

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Jeff truly believes that all customers deserve good service. He’s been building tools, inventing phone tree hacks and helping customers since before his days at GetHuman. He's also a Google GDE and involved in the Angular community.

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AT&T Wireless

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