If you’ve been lucky enough to buy an iPhone 6 at any point in the last few weeks, or have an iPhone 6 on the way, you’re probably wondering how to activate it at home. After all, you may be activating an iPhone for the first time without going to a carrier store. Here’s how to activate your iPhone 6 on Verizon.
If you’re like me, you bought the iPhone 6 online to have it shipped right to your front door. But if you’ve never had the comfort of activating a new smartphone in the comfort of your own home (and the carrier store did instead), then how exactly do you do it?
Surprisingly, it’s pretty easy and only takes a few minutes, and in case the instructions that came with your iPhone 6 weren’t clear enough, I’ll walk you through the steps on how to do it.
How to Activate Your iPhone 6
When you first turn on your iPhone 6, you will be greeted by the very familiar iOS Setup Assistant, which will say “Hello” to you in different languages. Make your way through the process. It will ask you your language, country of residence and tell you to connect to your home WiFi network.
Finally, you will come to the activation screen where your phone number will appear. Make sure this is your phone number and then press .
The next screen will ask you to enter your billing zip code that you use for your Verizon account followed by the last four digits of your social security number. Tap to proceed to the next step and accept the Terms and Conditions.
You will soon be taken to a screen where your iPhone 6 will begin the activation process. It says it may take a few minutes to activate, but it only took a minute for me.
Once the phone is activated, the iOS Setup Assistant will pick up where it left off and you’ll be prompted to sign in with your Apple ID and enable or disable certain features like Siri and Touch ID.
You don’t need to turn off your old iPhone during the process, but it’s usually a good idea to disable iCloud on your old iPhone and sign out of your Apple ID so you don’t continue to receive iMessages on your old iPhone. Other than that, once you activate your new iPhone 6, it will start the races and you will be able to start using it as your new iPhone.
Erase Your Old iPhone
Naturally, when you get a new iPhone, you’ll likely want to delete the old one completely so you can sell it.
We have a handy guide on how to sell your old iPhone, but before you sell it, it’s important to delete all data from the device. Simply put, you will want to disable Find My iPhone by first going to the app and tapping its icon. Turn it off from there and enter your Apple ID password to complete the process.
Then open the app and go to to reset all settings and delete all data on your old iPhone. There are six options to choose from, but you’ll want to choose.
You will be asked to enter your password and then you will receive a final prompt confirming the action. Tap on it to begin the deletion process. Let the iPhone do its thing and if it completes correctly, you will see the iOS Setup Assistant at startup. Your old iPhone is ready for sale and from there, you can turn it off by holding the power button and then swiping the onscreen prompt to turn it off.
