Transferring one iPhone to another - quick question

[Hakunatomato]

Hi there, I am buying DH a new iPhone for his 60th as a surprise. We will be celebrating at a location where the signal will not be that strong or consistent, and will probably not be enough to transfer his old phone to the new. If I do it before hand, will it wipe his old phone?I can’t quite remember as I did it with my phone about 3 years ago. I’d like to do it completely and just transfer his SIM card once he’s opened it. Do I need to put his sim in the new phone in order to transfer all the details? Thanks in advance.

It won't wipe it, no, but you would need his iCloud password and of course be able to unlock his phone.

I love the whole opening an brand new iPhone from its lovely packaging, getting a screen saver on while it is spotless new, setting up and reading the tips etc as it sets up. I would be really disappointed not to do it myself and if needed would prefer to wait until after the holiday and setup myself.

I might just be sad!

I transferred from an old to a new iPhone just this week and the only way you can tell anything has been done on the old one is that now if I go into settings it offers me the option to wipe / restore it. If you think he'd notice that then maybe don't.

I didn't need to move the SIM over until after all the data had been transferred.

It does ask you to set up face recognition as part of the process so I would say no, leave it to him to do. It doesn’t take long, the main nuisance are banking apps which all have different processes for transferring so that’s the hard part (though I do use 8 different banks so that may be part of the difficulty!)

We know each others password etc, so absolutely no problem getting in to it. He has no interest in setting up new gadgets etc. Despite being intelligent and degree level, he finds it easier to be helpless, and it would be me setting it up anyway, and it will be nice for him to take pictures when we are are away as his old phone is ancient. He is actually on my iCloud account as he could not be bothered to set up one of his own! Now I know it not wipe his phone I’ll just ask to borrow his and tell him I’m installing a new update or something, and do the deed. Thank you

As far as I remember the face recognition set-up was a skippable option. It asked me to set up a 6 digit pin which I then went back and changed to my usual 4 digit one afterwards.

the new phone will only transfer what has been backed up to that point, so if you do it days in advance then some stuff might be missing