How Can I Use My Phone in Another Country

February 16, 2022 Post a Comment

Having a phone that works only like it does at home when you're traveling internationally is probably the best thing you can do to reduce stress and maximize your ability to enjoy wherever you are. Existence able to use Google Maps and Translate, staying in bear on with friends and family at abode, having easy access to booking sites like Orbitz and Expedia in the event of delays—these are merely a few of the ways Internet access is invaluable while overseas.

But depending on your carrier, using data outside the US can be costly. The dreaded roaming fees alone tin can cause stress, with every moment yous spend online potentially racking up budget-destroying bills.

It doesn't have to be that way. Equally someone who's traveled to 12 different countries in the past year alone, I've learned many ways to travel with your current telephone cheaply—or at least for cheaper than you might think.

If yous travel outside of the US regularly, check out our All-time Cell Phone Plan for Frequent International Travel guide. Changing carriers (and maybe phones) can salvage you coin in the long run.

Option 1: Do nothing (or almost nix)

Every major cell telephone company has some sort of international roaming option. These range from first-class to extortionate and are your easiest (though not ofttimes best) selection.

If your carrier is T-Mobile, Sprint, or Google Project Fi, you're covered with some kind of unlimited data in almost countries around the globe. It's hard to beat out that for easy. With T-Mobile and Dart, yous become unlimited—simply relatively slow—2G data. It's fast enough for well-nigh messaging apps, translation tools, and maps (just be sure to download offline maps on Wi-Fi). But it's too slow to easily employ image-heavy social media similar Instagram or Snapchat—check out Options 2 and 3 beneath for ways to get faster service, if that's a priority. With Google Projection Fi, you get pretty much the same loftier-speed 4G you take at home.

For the most part, for any of the three aforementioned carriers, you simply enable "roaming data" in your phone's settings to showtime using the data. But it's all-time to check with your provider to be sure.

If you accept AT&T or Verizon (PDF), brand certain roaming and mobile data are turned off. The pay-per-use international roaming rates for both companies are exorbitant. These companies offer temporary information packs, but they're also expensive. Nosotros'll comprehend those in the next section.

Fortunately, if yous're on AT&T or Verizon and don't desire to pay their rates, information technology doesn't mean you lot're cut off from the Internet entirely while yous travel. Public Wi-Fi is everywhere, and whatsoever information you use while connected to information technology doesn't count as roaming. Depending on where you're headed, yous'll likely find gratis Wi-Fi in restaurants, tourist spots, and even some public parks and metro stations. And of class, nigh every hotel and hostel will accept Wi-Fi. However, the more expensive the adaptation, the more than likely it is that y'all'll have to pay extra for Cyberspace access.

If you're on public Wi-Fi, it's all-time not to access banking or other sensitive info without a VPN, just to be safe.

Option 2: Temporary information passes

These accept unlike names—Verizon's $10 TravelPass, AT&T'southward $x International Day Pass, T-Mobile's $5 International Pass, and Sprint'south $five to $x International High-Speed Data Roaming Pass—but all are the same thought. They provide a set amount of roaming information, usable for a certain amount of time, for i price. Demand some 4G information while you're in Paris? That volition be $v to $ten a solar day. Most companies offer a calendar month's worth of data at a slight disbelieve off the day-laissez passer charge per unit. AT&T, for case, will sell you 1 gigabyte of international roaming data to use over the course of a month for $60; at Verizon, information technology's half a gigabyte for $70.

Without question, these are all expensive, admitting less so than traditional roaming fees. If y'all tin't unlock your phone (it'due south new, say), data passes might be your merely way to utilize your phone while traveling without bankrupting yourself. For T-Mobile and Dart, buying a data pass—which y'all can exercise whenever y'all want before yous exit or while you lot're traveling—is a way to temporarily salve the annoyance of irksome 2G data. And some monthly plans, such as Verizon's Above Unlimited, include a few gratis data passes each billing period.

As for Projection Fi, it doesn't sell passes, as yous're already getting 4G data, wherever information technology's available, at the same rate you're paying for data at home.

For most non-Fi people, a far better option to data passes is getting a local SIM card.

Option 3: Get a local SIM carte

This is an option that's common everywhere except in the United States. A SIM, or subscriber identity module, is a removable fleck roughly the size of a microSD card. It lets your current phone work in some other country as if you bought the telephone there: local number, cheap and fast information, and then on.

When you land in a new country, but go to a local telecom store (the equivalent to Verizon or AT&T, in other words), and buy a temporary SIM. It's that easy. These are often called "pay-as-you lot-go" SIMs, merely some areas accept special SIM offers for travelers. Either way, they're usually good for a month and include more data than y'all'll probably apply. The store will likely help you install it as well, which takes seconds. Afterwards a telephone restart and a few minutes more, your phone works just as if yous bought it new in that state. When your trip is over and you're heading home, put your old SIM back in and your telephone returns to normal (brand sure you've disabled data-roaming till you lot're back in the U.s., though).

I've done this dozens of times in countries all over the world. It takes maybe half an 60 minutes out of my first day in the country, and makes traveling much easier; my phone works merely as information technology does at home. The only two drawbacks: you won't be using your "home" number while you're traveling, and you'll be without service from the fourth dimension you arrive in the land till y'all can go to a telecom store. (This is where a $5 to $10 data mean solar day laissez passer might come in handy, if you're worried about getting into town or finding your lodgings without phone service.)

You lot can also purchase SIMs at the airport and many tourist/souvenir shops, merely these are often more expensive. I stick with SIMs from the main telecoms in a country, assuming they'll offer the best coverage and service. For example, if there'south an event with my Vodafone SIM in the UK, I tin go into endless Vodafone stores everywhere. Non so much with "Joe's Travel SIM XXXtrafast" from a random travel stand. Wikipedia lists the main providers in Europe, Asia/Pacific, Africa and the Middle East, and the Americas, and so y'all can have an idea of what to look for when y'all arrive.

There are also "travel SIMs" that you can buy alee of fourth dimension that merits to work everywhere in the world, but I've researched these extensively, and all are more expensive than buying a SIM at your destination. Though prices vary, about local SIMs cost $x to $twenty and are good for a month with several gigs of data. I've paid equally much as $35 and as little as $6.

The trick with this option is that your phone needs to be unlocked. Each company has different requirements to do this. Generally, the telephone needs to accept been on the visitor's network for a certain length of time, and you need to have paid the telephone off (or fulfilled your contract, if you lot still accept 1). To find out more on how to practise this, check out the Unlocking your phone section of our "Best Cell Telephone Plan for Frequent International Travel" guide.

One drawback for some people is if someone calls your "real" number, information technology volition just become to voicemail, and you won't see whatever texts from them till you lot put your old, home-carrier SIM dorsum in your phone and access a cell network or, depending on your carrier, Wi-Fi. Your telephone is substantially a different telephone. You tin requite friends/family your "new" temporary number for emergencies, or inquire them to use a data-based messaging service like WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger. You might as well put your temporary number on your "real" approachable voicemail message.

Option four: Rent a hotspot

You rent a small device, perchance slightly larger than a phone, that creates a picayune zone of Wi-Fi for you lot and your family. Connect all of your devices to it, then turn it off when you don't need information technology.

The main reward to this option is if you lot're traveling with others, y'all and all of your gear can tether to the single hotspot instead of you all having to buy travel data. Of course, any fellow member of the group who leaves your footling Wi-Fi bubble to explore solo will have to give up Cyberspace admission while doing so.

This is something to look for at an aerodrome, or research before you lot become, because you have to return the concrete device. That means either dropping it off where you lot got information technology, or mailing it back when you get home.

This is non something I've tried, nor does it seem very popular, but it could work for you lot if the other options here aren't exactly what yous're looking for. I've seen prices in the under-$10-a-twenty-four hours range, which is expensive compared with other options, merely for a family unit traveling for 2 weeks somewhere, the cost of getting local SIMs for everyone may rival the price of renting a hotspot.

As well keep in mind that most phones can create their own Wi-Fi hotspots, so if you lot get a local SIM menu, you can tether a tablet, a calculator, or another phone to yours and share your Internet without having to pay actress for a concrete hotspot device. Some SIMs don't allow this, though, so best to check before you buy.

Option v: Use an quondam telephone (or get a cheap one) instead

If you're the type of person who holds on to old phones, dust off the newest of them and information technology could be your key to easy international travel. As long as information technology's not as well onetime (nether four years is a safe bet), and the battery can however hold a charge, and y'all're able to update its software via Wi-Fi, y'all should be able to use information technology when you travel by buying local SIM cards. Cheque with whatsoever cell phone company you lot used the phone with to make sure that the phone is unlocked.

Oh, and if you go this road, keep in mind that some providers will unlock only one phone per account in whatever 12-calendar month period. I plant this out the hard mode.

In one case it's unlocked (if information technology wasn't already), follow Selection iii in a higher place. You lot'll still accept to go a new phone number with every SIM carte du jour, but otherwise you'll be using your familiar erstwhile handset with all of your contacts and apps merely as you left them.

If you don't have a usable old phone, y'all could instead buy a new, but cheap and unlocked, phone. For case, our selection for a budget Android phone is swell for the money, takes good pictures, can create a Wi-Fi hotspot, and costs $160. After three or four trips using $twenty local SIMs instead of month-long information passes, you'll have fabricated back your investment.