Can I use a Samsung Galaxy J5 Duos (2016) purchased in the Philippines with a Canadian SIM card?

[mountain55]

Hi, I have a Samsung Galaxy J5 Duos (2016) that I bought in the Philippines a few years ago. When I bought the phone, it wasn't purchased from a coverage provider, the phone was purchased from a Samsung store in a mall in the Philippines. later I put a SIM card in and used the phone while I was on a trip there.

Now I'm wondering, if I reset the phone and put in a SIM from a Canadian prepaid provider, if it will work in Canada? Or is the phone itself somehow "region locked" to Asia? I tried putting the IMEI in to a "check your phone's compatibility" box in the bring your own device section of a Canadian cell phone company, and it said it wasn't compatible.

Thanks in advance for any help with this!

 

[B. Diddy]

Welcome to Android Central! What's the exact model number of the phone, and which carrier are you considering? The important thing is to see if the phone supports the network bands the carrier uses.

 

[mountain55]

Thanks for your reply! The exact model number of the phone is Samsung SM-J510GN, the description is "Galaxy J5 (2016)". Again, I bought the phone from a Samsung store, in a mall, in the Philippines, a few years ago. At that time, I was able to buy a SIM card in the Philippines, pop it in and the phone worked great.

The network I would like to use the phone on now, in Canada, is Lucky Mobile which is the discount brand operated by Bell Mobility Canada. I am hoping to be able to get a SIM card from Lucky Mobile, and use their "Bring Your Own Phone" plan in Canada.

 

[B. Diddy]

I don't think it'll work on LTE. Lucky Mobile's support site says the phone has to support LTE band 4 (1700/2100 AWS) or the 700 MHz spectrum that includes bands 12/17/13/29. The phone doesn't support band 4, and the only 700 MHz band it supports is 28. It'll work on 3G, but that will obviously mean slower data speeds.

https://www.sammobile.com/devices/galaxy-j5/specs/SM-J510GN/
https://www.luckymobile.ca/support/phone/sim-card
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_Mobility#LTE (Lucky Mobile uses Bell Mobility's network)

 

[mountain55]

3G data speed would be fine with me, as it's more of a backup device that I won't use much. Does not working on 4G mean the phone would be entirely incompatible with the Lucky Mobile network, or, will it automatically fall back to 3G? Thanks for your incredibly helpful answer so far!! Really appreciate it.

 

[B. Diddy]

If the phone can't connect to 4G, it'll fall back to 3G. I'm not sure if the lack of 4G support would cause any battery drain, since hypothetically the cell radio might work harder to search for 4G bands. If you go to Settings>Mobile Networks>Preferred Network Type, you could see if there's an option to limit the phone to 2G/3G.

I think the only way the phone would be completely incompatible would be if Lucky Mobile relied on VoLTE for phone calls and shut down their 2G network (like AT&T did). But I don't see any mention of that.