{"id":6187,"date":"2020-01-29T08:45:18","date_gmt":"2020-01-29T16:45:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/?p=6187"},"modified":"2023-01-11T13:48:54","modified_gmt":"2023-01-11T21:48:54","slug":"top-tips-for-recycling-your-old-cellphone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/top-tips-for-recycling-your-old-cellphone\/","title":{"rendered":"TOP TIPS FOR RECYCLING YOUR OLD CELLPHONE"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>If you received a new cellphone during the holidays, don\u2019t just toss the old one in a junk drawer or a shoe box at the back of your closet. There are many ways you can either give your old cellphone new life, or dispose of it in an environmentally friendly way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Whatever you choose, be sure to remove all of your personal data from the device. Start by backing up your contacts to your SIM card, or to your Google account or Apple ID. Next, save any photos, music, videos or documents you have on the device to an SD card, a computer, or to cloud storage, like Google Photos or iCloud. Then, perform a factory reset to clear any settings you\u2019ve personalized, and restore the phone\u2019s software to its original state. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To factory reset an Android smartphone: <\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul>\n<li>Open <strong>Settings<\/strong>. <\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Scroll to <strong>Backup and Reset<\/strong>.\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Tap <strong>Factory Data Reset<\/strong>.\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>You may be prompted to enter a pass code, if you\u2019ve set one, to\nerase your data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To clear the settings on an iPhone: <\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul>\n<li>Open <strong>Settings<\/strong>; <\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Scroll to <strong>General. <\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Tap<strong> Reset<\/strong>. <\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Tap <strong>Erase All Content and\nSettings<\/strong>. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>You\u2019ll need to enter your Apple ID and passcode to complete the\nprocess.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If your phone is still in good working order, consider passing it on to a friend or family member. You can even add additional lines on your existing Consumer Cellular account for them, and share minutes, text messages, and data from your <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\" (opens in a new tab)\" href=\"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/shopping\/choose\/plan\" target=\"_blank\">monthly plan<\/a>. By simply inserting one of our free <a href=\"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/shopping\/details\/SIM\/details\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\" (opens in a new tab)\">SIM cards<\/a>, the new user can activate your old phone, and just like that, you\u2019re sharing connections. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You can also donate unwanted cellphones. There are a wide variety of organizations to choose from, like <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\" (opens in a new tab)\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cellphonesforsoldiers.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Cell Phones for Soldiers<\/a>, which distributes them to military members serving overseas, or <a href=\"https:\/\/securethecall.org\/how-we-do-it\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\" (opens in a new tab)\">Secure The Call<\/a>, an organization that accepts used cell phones and then repurposes them as emergency-only devices meant to dial 911 dispatchers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If ultimately you decide your phone just isn\u2019t in good enough shape to reuse, take a minute to check out recycling resources in your area to avoid having it go to the landfill. You can find help with <a href=\"https:\/\/search.earth911.com\/?utm_source=earth911-header&amp;utm_medium=top-navigation-menu&amp;utm_campaign=top-nav-recycle-search-button\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" aria-label=\" (opens in a new tab)\">Earth 911\u2019s<\/a> local search engine to find the most convenient location.&nbsp; <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Your old phone has been a good companion to you. Even though you\nmay be excited to have a new one, take some time to give this old friend a\nproper goodbye.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you received a new cellphone during the holidays, don\u2019t just toss the old one in a junk drawer or a shoe box at the back of your closet. There are many ways you can either give your old cellphone new life, or dispose of it in an environmentally friendly way. Whatever you choose, be [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":6188,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[13],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v19.13 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\r\n<title>TOP TIPS FOR RECYCLING YOUR OLD CELLPHONE<\/title>\r\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Your old cellphone doesn\u2019t have to sit in your junk drawer or end up in a landfill. Follow these tips to help protect the data you may have stored on the device, and find a way to dispose of it in a way that makes sense.\" \/>\r\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\r\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/top-tips-for-recycling-your-old-cellphone\/\" \/>\r\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Susan Thomas\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\r\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"TOP TIPS FOR RECYCLING YOUR OLD CELLPHONE","description":"Your old cellphone doesn\u2019t have to sit in your junk drawer or end up in a landfill. Follow these tips to help protect the data you may have stored on the device, and find a way to dispose of it in a way that makes sense.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/top-tips-for-recycling-your-old-cellphone\/","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Susan Thomas","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/top-tips-for-recycling-your-old-cellphone\/","url":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/top-tips-for-recycling-your-old-cellphone\/","name":"TOP TIPS FOR RECYCLING YOUR OLD CELLPHONE","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/#website"},"datePublished":"2020-01-29T16:45:18+00:00","dateModified":"2023-01-11T21:48:54+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/bea0076e2c8f754131a2652cab7eef98"},"description":"Your old cellphone doesn\u2019t have to sit in your junk drawer or end up in a landfill. Follow these tips to help protect the data you may have stored on the device, and find a way to dispose of it in a way that makes sense.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/top-tips-for-recycling-your-old-cellphone\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/top-tips-for-recycling-your-old-cellphone\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/top-tips-for-recycling-your-old-cellphone\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"TOP TIPS FOR RECYCLING YOUR OLD CELLPHONE"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/","name":"Our Blog","description":"Consumer Cellular Blog","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/bea0076e2c8f754131a2652cab7eef98","name":"Susan Thomas","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/97587a1993268816fb7e8b3468bfb3d7?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/97587a1993268816fb7e8b3468bfb3d7?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Susan Thomas"},"sameAs":["http:\/\/www.consumercellular.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/author\/susan\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6187"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6187"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6187\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7407,"href":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6187\/revisions\/7407"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6188"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6187"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6187"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consumercellular.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6187"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}