AT&T (Quietly) Activates FaceTime Over Cellular. How to Turn It On.

Can you smell AT&T Apple owners finally joining the future of face to face mobile communication? According to user kre62 of the MacRumor’s forum, after months of hemming and hawing (and legal threats) mobile provider AT&T has finally caved in, and turned on FaceTime over cellular data – something its rivals at Verizon and Sprint have allowed for awhile now.

The change is in effect for all Apple mobile devices whose hardware configuration is compliant with iOS 6, meaning iPhone 4S’s and 5’s, as well as the iPad 3 or higher – even those with unlimited data plans. Previously, AT&T hinted that only iPhone 5’s with tiered data plans would get the update.

I gave it a shot with my iPhone 4S (grandfathered unlimited data plan) and was (finally) able to move the forbidden slider over in my FaceTime menu. It took two reboots and ignoring a discouraging message, but Heaven and Earth finally slid over that fated quarter inch.

So how do you turn on FaceTime over cellular for your 3G/4G enabled iDevice? Here’s a step-by-step:

  • First of all, make sure you have updated your iDevice to iOS 6.
  • Visit your Settings and find the FaceTime icon by scrolling down in the General settings.
  • Turn on FaceTime on the top of the menu, if you haven’t already. For iPhones, your phone number should be listed already and checked. Add or check any email addresses you wish to be contacted over FaceTime with.
  • Wait until your FaceTime account has been activated for the iDevice – it’s a message under the place you just turned FaceTime on. You might have to check the email account associated with your iTunes account and click on a verification email. If you’ve already verified FaceTime on another iDevice, FaceTime should activate after less than a minute.
  • Restart your iDevice normally.
  • Visit Settings – FaceTime again and scroll to the bottom of the screen. Slide Use Cellular Data to On. You might get a message stating that you need to contact AT&T to make this happen. Just ignore the message.
  • Hard reboot your iDevice again by holding down the round home button and the on/off switch on the top of your iDevice until the screen absolutely goes black.
  • Turn on your iDevice again and recheck Settings – FaceTime to see if Use Cellular Data is On. If not, try to move it. You should be good to go.
  • Repeat for your other 3G/4G enabled iDevices.

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