TECHNOLOGY
Carrier-Explode 2.0 decodes and compares carrier settings from iPhone, Pixel and Galaxy firmware
A new version of Carrier-Explode, lets people look up APNs, VoLTE, Wi-Fi Calling and 5G settings by carrier and phone, and compare builds. The project asks for help improving its decoders.
Image: Carrier-Explode
Carrier-Explode 2.0 is out. It is a site that reads the carrier settings packed inside iPhone, Pixel and Galaxy firmware, decodes them and puts them side by side.
Carrier settings are the small configuration files that tell a phone how to work on a particular network. They cover things like APNs (the access point names a phone uses to get mobile data), VoLTE (voice calls over 4G), Wi-Fi Calling and 5G. On Carrier-Explode, you can look up these settings for a carrier on each phone, pick the features you need, and see which carriers have them. You can also compare any two versions or carriers and see what each build changed.
The makers say the decoders are still a work in progress and ask people to contribute. The site lists Alec Dusheck as a contributor, and says everything was built on other people's work.
For iPhones, the site reads restore images (IPSWs, the files Apple uses to restore a phone) from ipsw.me, along with beta build data from AppleDB and Apple's own carrier bundle manifest. The first two are checked every 20 minutes and the manifest every 6 hours. IPSWs are read for every iPhone released since September 2023. Every build from 5 October 2026 is read; for earlier builds, it covers every release and the betas of the newest major version. iPad and Apple Watch bundles come only from the manifest.
For Pixels, it reads each phone's full OTA image (the over-the-air update file), including its carrier settings and modem configuration. Those are checked daily. It also reads the carrier settings files Google publishes after a build ships, every 6 hours. Images are read for every Pixel released since October 2020. Every build from 5 October 2026 is read, and for earlier ones, each Pixel's last build of each quarterly release.
For Samsung Galaxy phones, the site pulls model and build lists from Google Play's supported devices and Samsung's version.xml, both checked every 20 minutes. It reads the firmware itself from Samsung's firmware update server whenever a new build appears. That covers regional models of the Galaxy S, Z Fold, Z Flip, A5x and A3x lines launched since January 2025, with FE models left out. Samsung only offers a model's current firmware, not an archive, so a Galaxy's history on the site starts when the site began reading it.
Some names come from outside sources. Device names come from AppleDB, Google's OTA page and Samsung's server. Codes that no source names, such as a device, a carrier bundle or a modem family, are named weekly by a language model from a web search, and the site keeps the page it read the name on. A SIM's country is worked out from its MCC (mobile country code). Test networks are marked as such and never link two carriers.
The site credits earlier projects that worked out how to fetch, extract and read these files. They include dwilliamsuk/ios-carrier-bundles, GrapheneOS/adevtool, SamloaderKotlin (now Bifrost) and OmcTextDecoder, among others. Its carrier logos are redrawn from Wikimedia Commons, Wikipedia or company websites, and are shown only to say which carrier a bundle belongs to. The site says it is not affiliated with or endorsed by any carrier, Apple, Google or Samsung.