Nearly everybody has faced the annoying “SIM card data refreshing” issue at some point in their digital life. Your phone may show this message often or once in a blue moon. This doesn’t matter—this message is not ordinary. If it occurs, your network and connection are in a disarray. You might be wondering what this message means. Generally, you receive the data refreshing notification when your SIM card receives an update OTA (over-the-air). In such a case, your phone starts re-reading your SIM card’s data into its memory. If it is not an update, then there could be potentially two major reasons behind this.
Either your SIM card or the SIM card reader of your phone is faulty. There could be some more explanations too. Maybe the signal strength in your area is weak. Or, perhaps, you are located on the border of two clusters of mobile networks. Likewise, there are potentially many techniques to fix this issue. These methods could be either software or hardware-related. Luckily, you have us to show you several solutions to this problem in the following sections.
1. You may need to replace the faulty SIM card
If your SIM card is faulty then replace it with a new one. Your carrier will provide it either for free or at a nominal fee. The replacement SIM card will use the same mobile number, and you will continue to employ your existing plan as well. But it is important to note that assuming your SIM card is faulty without checking will unnecessarily cost you time, effort, and money.
Therefore, first fit in another SIM card in your device to see if it is working. Borrow a SIM card from someone or if you have another active SIM card, insert it into your device. If you don’t get the “refreshing SIM data” message with another SIM card, then certainly the original one is defective.
2. The SIM card reader in your device might be damaged
In rare cases, your phone’s SIM card reader can be at fault. It will show the “refreshing SIM data” or “refreshing SIM card” notification. It could be because your SIM slot is worn out, or it may have been damaged due to a phone drop or some other reason. If you want to check if it is surely your SIM reader’s fault, then insert another SIM card into it. If it continues to show you the same refreshing message, then it is almost confirmed that the fault isn’t in your SIM card, but in the reader.
One more way to test it is to insert your SIM card into another phone. If the SIM card works fine in another phone, then for sure your original one is faulty. The solution to this is simple — take it to the official service center of your handset or to a good phone technician and either get it fixed or acquire a new one.
3. Your smart device’s mobile network could be wrong
There are multiple ways to make changes in your phone’s settings to fix the issue in question. We will show some basic settings step by step in this section. For an Android phone, use the following steps:
- Open your phone’s Settings app.
- Tap on the Mobile Networks option.
- Tap on the Access Point Name (APN).
- Click on More in the top right corner.
- Click on the Reset to Default option.
- Restart your phone.
Following these steps may resolve the issue. If it doesn’t or your device is different, and these steps can’t be followed, utilize the set of instructions given in the next sections.
4. The Network Mode setting may be incorrectly configured
To check whether the configuration of Network Mode is wrong, do the following:
- Tap on the Settings app.
- Tap on the Connections option.
- Next, tap the option Mobile Networks.
- Tap on SIM 1 or SIM 2 (whichever SIM has the refreshing issue).
- Select your phone’s network mode option as LTE/3G/2G (auto connect).
5. Device’s Network Operator settings might be improperly set up
To resolve the issue of your SIM card refreshing frequently, you should set your device’s network operator as “automatically”. To do this, follow these instructions:
- Tap on the Settings menu.
- Tap on the Connections option.
- Click on the Mobile Networks option.
- Tap the Network Operators option.
- Select the Automatic/Automatically option.
- Tap on the OK button. You will get registered on the network.
In some cases, turning your network setting to “GSM only” does the job. If the issue gets resolved with any methods given above, you are good to go. If it doesn’t, you should contact the customer service team of your carrier to settle the issue. Either call your mobile operator’s helpline number or visit an official outlet nearby in person.