So, if you’re an American where SMS (text messaging) is still dominant and hasn’t been completely replaced by WhatsApp/Viber/Telegram or one of the dozens of better solutions, you probably feel a slave to your carrier when you travel. Carriers like Verizon and AT&T offer international data plans, but they can cost a fortune ($10 a day x 30 days = $300 a month!). Other, more travel friendly carriers like T-Mobile and Google Fi offer good data options, but still charge if making phone calls or sending texts to/from other countries and, frankly, don’t have the best coverage when you’re back in the US.
VOIP Pros:
- Change or cancel carriers any time you want without worrying about transferring your number
- Use local SIMs for WAY cheaper data
- Make calls and send texts directly from your laptop
- Have the same number on multiple phones
- Immediately be back with the same number if your phone gets lost or stolen, instead of waiting to have a SIM card sent to wherever you are
- Pick the area code you want
VOIP Cons:
- iMessage won’t work with your new number (though you can still use it with your email, or whatever number is tied to your SIM at any moment)
- Every once in a while, things like two factor authentication and SMS verification systems don’t work (see below for my solution to this).
Decoupling your number from a carrier is a great idea for anyone, in my opinion. Think about it, is your email address coupled to your internet service provider? This might sound ridiculous, but it used to be like this (some of you reading this might be old enough to have once had an @aol.com address or similar). Then came things like gmail, yahoo, and thousands of others. Things like this exist for phone service as well.
The solution I’m about to suggest is slightly more complicated than it might seem necessary, but there is a reason!
First, get a paid VOIP (Voice Over IP) service. I personally recommend TextNow, which technically has a free tier, however the ad free version is worth the money ($9.99 / month), in my opinion. Once you install this application on your phone, you should be able to make and receive calls from it. If you have an android, you can actually even make this your default dialer if you wish. Add $5 of credit and you get calling to international numbers at super cheap rates ($0.01 per minute for most locations I regularly spend time in). Moreover, you can make calls and send texts from your computer (or anywhere you have a web browser, should you be stranded somewhere without your phone or laptop). The problem with TextNow that I’ve found is the interface isn’t amazing and it often fails to verify things like Uber and WhatsApp accounts. See next paragraph…
Next, get a Google Voice number and use it as your actual number – the one you give to people. It can do everything that TextNow can do and generally, it does it better. The text interface is superior, call quality – especially on speaker phone is great, and it auto-transcribes voicemails and lets you read them without ever having to listen to someone having a conversation with themselves in your inbox. Moreover, it works better for verification of accounts. But that doesn’t make any sense… if it can do everything TextNow does and it does it better, why not just get Google Voice? Hell, it’s 100% free even (except for international calls, which it bills similarly to TextNow). Well, the answer to why not JUST get Google Voice is that Google Voice annoyingly requires a forwarding number, and that number must be a US number. Luckily, you can forward it to a TextNow number! Additionally, when roaming outside the US, when you place calls, Google Fi actually just forwards the call to your forwarding number (I still don’t understand WHY it works this way as it doesn’t do this when receiving calls nor when placing them on WIFI.). This means it won’t work at all if you have your US SIM temporarily switched out for a local one, and some pretty high, unexpected charges if you’re using a provider like T-Mobile or Google Fi (still more on these later).
Now, congratulations, you’ve decoupled your number. You’re now free to solve the issue of connectivity 1,000,000 different ways. You can still use a US SIM, get a local SIM, even go dual SIM, if your phone allows it! Wifi… Starlink… hotspot off your friend. You’ll still have access to your phone number, everywhere you go!
T-Mobile/Google Fi
Two US carriers, T-Mobile and Google Fi are both essentially “international” carriers, at least when it comes to data, in that they don’t charge more when you’re in the US or out. First, I’ll go into T-Mobile. T-Mobile offers unlimited international data at 0 extra cost. There is a catch, however. You are limited to 128kbps on their standard plan and you can pay $15 extra per month to go all the way up to a lightening 256kbps! For those who aren’t technically inclined, this is extremely slow by modern standards. This is basically the equivalent of 2G, or about the speeds you were getting in 2003 in the United States, if you even had a smart phone then. This means you can send WhatsApp messages or SMS from Google Voice, check email, or do some basic navigation on your maps application (hopefully you have a local map saved), but not much else. For some though, this is fine. Especially if you have a dual sim phone and just want it as a backup or you are regularly on wifi. Moreover, T-Mobile still gets full speed data (limited to 5GB monthly usage), as well as unlimited calling and texting in Canada and Mexico. So if you’re only in those countries, T-Mobile might even mean you can ignore everything else I’ve said so far in this article (though I don’t recommend it).
T-Mobile Pros:
- Zero extra cost for data no matter how much you use
- Gives calling and SMS in Canada and Mexico
T-Mobile Cons:
- Slow as dog crap
- Phones purchased with T-Mobile are branded for life, even if after they are unlocked
Google Fi is a bit more robust than T-Mobile, and for most people, this will be the better choice, in my opinion (even if it does have the worst customer service in the world). Google Fi (not to be confused with Google Voice) is Google’s carrier. Many people don’t even realize Google has a phone service, which isn’t surprising. They don’t have stores, they don’t run TV commercials, and they barely even advertise on the internet. They actually don’t even have their own towers. Like many discount carriers, they rent tower time on other carriers’ towers in the US, and, more relevant here, abroad. With Google Fi, you will receive 4G speeds at the same price as if you were using them in the US ($20 for the line then + $10/GB, then free after 6GB – until 15 GB). Speeds are pretty good and usually about the same as if you were using a local SIM. Also, with Google Fi, you can pause your service for 90 days at a time, making it an ideal stop gap when arriving in a new country before you can acquire a local SIM. An issue with Google Fi as a long term solution, however, is there are many stories of Google Fi customers having their service turned off after spending more than 6 months without connecting to a US based tower. I’ve personally spent more than 6 months at a time outside of the US and this has never happened to me, but be warned!
Google Fi Pros:
- 4G LTE speeds wherever you go!
- Max phone bill of $80/month (if you don’t make international calls from you Fi number like a dummy or go over 15GB / month)
- Easy to pause for 90 periods (and repause again for 90 more days, etc).
- Can hotspot on Android
Google Fi Cons:
- Terrible, horrible, awful, horrendous customer service.
- See above.
- Requirement to connect to a US tower every 6 months (supposedly)
- iPhones can’t hotspot Fi data connections (supposedly this should be fixed soon, but they’ve been saying this for a long time)
Sign up for Fi and receive a $20 Fi Credit
Local SIM
No contract, pay as you go SIMs are generally super easy to pick up and pop in your phone almost anywhere in the world (especially the “developing world”). The rates are almost always much cheaper than anything you’re going to find in the US and the speeds are reliability are also almost always going to be what you get with a US carrier on roaming.
Local SIM Pros:
- Cheapest rates
- Best speed
- Usually super easy to find and set up (national chain convenience stores such as Oxxo, 7-11, etc usually sell them)
- Usually easy to recharge online or at a convenience store
- Get a local number for calling
Local SIM Cons:
- No connectivity when you first land (often when you need connectivity the most)
- A pain in the ass when regularly switching countries outside the carriers’ service areas
- Every once in a while, countries have registration measures that can be a bit of a pain (Argentina, for example, makes you go into the office and register with your passport)
Dual SIM
So, this is straight up the best of both worlds – coupling a provider like Google Fi/T-Mobile with a local SIM in a dual SIM phone (alternatively, simply popping the SIMs in and out as needed accomplishes most of the same goals, just with less convenience). The only issue with this is few phones have this feature (especially the versions sold in the US). Increasingly common is something called an “eSIM”, which means the phone has a SIM built into it that you can use to put it on the US network, while leaving the SIM slot open for a local SIM. iPhones actually have this in all phones since the iPhone XS. The trick with eSIMs can often be the network itself as well as the limitations of the phone, but that’s beyond the scope of this article.
Dual SIM Pros:
- It’s the best option
Dual SIM Cons:
- Only a few phone/carrier combinations work with this
In conclusion, the most important part of this process, in my opinion, is separating your number from your carrier. A hybrid option of Google Voice and TextNow is currently my recommendation solution for reasons listed above. Once you do this, you are free to set yourself up with a myriad of data provider solutions, the best of which for most people (unless you have Dual SIM) is actually a combination I only hinted at above – I’ll call it swap-SIM, where you have a US based work-anywhere SIM from either T-Mobile or Google Fi, then get a local SIM whenever you get to a country you’re going to be in for awhile, and pause your service.
There you have it. Please let me know in the comments below or feel free to message me if this article was helpful (or if I royally screwed something up). Travel and the technology that supports it are always evolving and I’m sure (or at least hope) there will be even better solutions coming out all the time. I’ll try to keep this updated as they do. Travel safe and prosper!