Questions and Answers

Lucky,
I was reading Ford’s article yesterday about you and his travels to Cartagena and Bogota and in it he mentioned using Uber while in country. Did you have international cell service? or use wifi to hail down a ride? With that being said I am thinking of planning a trip to So. Africa in the not too distant future and was wondering what the best way to remain (somewhat) in contact with my family while down there/using google maps to get around/etc.?

Thanks!

TMobile provides unlimited international 2G data, adn you can pay for international 4G LTE data buckets. AT&T, Verizon, Sprint all have international data plans you can pay for.

Google Maps now have offline maps where you can download an entire area ahead of time to use when you are not connected to the internet and it has gotten much better since it was first released a few years ago.

You could also get a local SIM card for your phone, provided that you bring an unlocked phone. If you have Verizon, all their phones come already unlocked

I’d say the most economical way, if your phone is unlocked, is to get a local sim card with a few GBs of data on it

[QUOTE=”David W, post: 14257, member: 29″]TMobile provides unlimited international 2G data, adn you can pay for international 4G LTE data buckets. AT&T, Verizon, Sprint all have international data plans you can pay for.

Google Maps now have offline maps where you can download an entire area ahead of time to use when you are not connected to the internet and it has gotten much better since it was first released a few years ago.

You could also get a local SIM card for your phone, provided that you bring an unlocked phone. If you have Verizon, all their phones come already unlocked[/QUOTE]
AT&T refuses to unlock my iPhone 6 so I’m stuck doing international data through them :/

If you can spend some time, the best way is to get a temp number in the local country. Some places need a day to activate your service but not all.
If you can make things work for you via WiFi apps/services like Whatsapp, Skype, Google Voice, Viber will be very handy.

As far as cell phone service is concerned:
1. Local SIM
2. International Plans
ATT has a program called Passport/Passport Plus and Passport Pro. While they are not cheap they will serve some basic purpose like texting, few MBs of data.
TMobile has similar plans but I don’t think you will have to add on anything separately.
If you travel abroad a lot, buying a phone with Project Fi and use international could be a good idea as well. Since it is a prepaid service, you can pay as you go.
Right now, Google has the Nexus 5X on sale if you activate Project Fi (at least for a month). [URL=’http://slickdeals.net/f/8548219-project-fi-service-lg-google-nexus-5x-4g-lte-smartphone-32gb-250-16gb-200-activation-req’]Click here for more details. [/URL]

[USER=29]@David W[/USER] ….. Sprint actually also provides free international 2G data and unlimited texting. I saved about $100 by using my phone for nav instead of a GPS from a rental car company on a road trip through New Zealand in January.