Will it work with Fi?
- Yes it will but it will only use T-Mobile Towers, US Cellular and Sprint towers will not work. Being that this is true swapping between towers will also not work between the companies. TO get a better picture of if you would be covered i advise looking at the T-Mobile coverage map as Googles coverage map includes all three services.
Does it Support WiFi Calling & Text? Yes...but not in the conventional way. You will not have native support for WiFi calling OR sending text messages through WiFi if your service area is low using the default sms and phone apps.
- In order to get this feature you will have to use Hangouts, since Hangouts is part of Google, you can connect your Fi phone number to that app and it will sync. Using that app it will grab your contacts, and you can place WiFi calling or data calling. You can also send and receive text via WiFi or cellular data. Please note that when you text or call using hangouts it will use data however its minimal. But when on Wifi you will have no issues.
- If someone calls you while not on Wifi your default phone app will ring AND Hangouts will ring, however it will place the default phone app over the hangouts app so you choose the better option for you. If you have no cell service and are only on wifi then it will text and ring via hangouts.
- Short story, your new main sms app will be hangouts and you will either place calls or receive calls via hangouts depending on your situation. But it i all done automatically.
Will Google Support....support you?
- In a way yes they will, as far as activating the phone or having any question in helping you get setup they can assist, however if something goes wrong, or you have sms or mms issues or call issues, since our phones are not supported they will not dive deep into issues such as these.
Will the phone activate?
- I saw many people in many places i read say you cannot activate the sim on a non Project Fi phone. However while this might possibly be true for others, for a Razer Phone it is not. Once you receive the SIM card from them, you will download the Project Fi app and it will start to activate. It will warn you and let you know that yes this phone is not supported but it will still work with T-Mobile towers and so on. Sim was activiated and all features like calling, texting, mms. All works out of the box with no tweaking.
I hope this helps others as i have gone through the test, and I had these questions before making the dive. Please understand that i tried to focus on the major parts of using this service both good and bad. In the end, it does work and i've been using it for sometime now. The main draw back if you can live with it is having to use Hangouts for your sms app and wifi calling needs when you have no service. If you have service where you live then you wont have to fight with any of this, However for me, where i live i have ZERO service which is i why i left them sadly. But figuring out how to now have active wifi sms and calling i went back. Hope this helps.