draver

The current T-Mobile coverage map shows 2G & 3G coverage at Maun, but does your phone have those bands? Botswana is listed in the 215+ Roaming Country Guide.

Edited to add Roaming List 8-15-23:

Afghanistan

Aland Islands

Albania

Alderney

Algeria

Andorra

Angola

Anguilla

Antigua and Barbuda

Argentina

Armenia

Aruba

Australia

Austria

Azerbaijan

Azores

Bahamas

Bahrain

Bangladesh

Barbados

Belarus

Belgium

Belize

Benin

Bermuda

Bolivia

Bonaire

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Botswana

Brazil

British Virgin Islands

Brunei Darussalam

Bulgaria

Burkina Faso

Burundi

Cambodia

Cameroon

Canada

Canary Islands

Cape Verde

Cayman Islands

Central African Republic

Chad

Chile

China

Christmas Island

Colombia

Congo

Congo, Democratic Republic

Costa Rica

Cote d'Ivoire

Croatia

Curacao

Cyprus

Czech Republic

Denmark

Dominica

Dominican Republic

Easter Island

Ecuador

Egypt

El Salvador

Estonia

Faroe Islands

Fiji

Finland

France

French Guiana

French Polynesia

Gabon

Gambia

Georgia

Germany

Ghana

Gibraltar

Greece

Greenland

Grenada

Guadeloupe

Guam

Guatemala

Guernsey

Guinea

Guinea-Bissau

Guyana

Haiti

Herm

Honduras

Hong Kong

Hungary

Iceland

India

Indonesia

Iraq

Ireland

Isle of Man

Israel

Italy

Jamaica

Japan

Jersey

Jordan

Kazakhstan

Kenya

Kosovo

Kuwait

Kyrgyzstan

Laos

Latvia

Liberia

Liechtenstein

Lithuania

Luxembourg

Macau

Macedonia

Madagascar

Madeira

Malawi

Malaysia

Maldives

Mali

Malta

Marie Galante

Martinique

Mauritania

Mauritius

Mayotte

Mexico

Moldova

Monaco

Mongolia

Montenegro

Montserrat

Morocco

Mozambique

Myanmar

Nauru

Nepal

Netherlands

New Zealand

Nicaragua

Niger

Nigeria

Northern Ireland

Norway

Oman

Pakistan

Palestinian Territories

Panama

Papua New Guinea

Paraguay

Peru

Philippines

Poland

Portugal

Qatar

Reunion

Romania

Rota

Russia

Rwanda

Saint Barthelemy

Saint Eustatius

Saint Kitts and Nevis

Saint Lucia

Saint Martin

Saba

Saint Vincent and the Grenadines

Saipan

Samoa

San Marino

Sark Island

Saudi Arabia

Scotland

Senegal

Serbia

Seychelles

Sierra Leone

Singapore

Sint Maarten

Slovakia

Slovenia

South Africa

South Korea

Spain

Sri Lanka

Suriname

Svalbard

Sweden

Switzerland

Taiwan

Tajikistan

Tanzania

Thailand

Tinian

Togo

Tonga

Trinidad and Tobago

Tunisia

Turkey

Turkmenistan

Turks and Caicos Islands

Uganda

Ukraine

United Arab Emirates

United Kingdom (England)

Uruguay

Uzbekistan

Vanuatu

Vatican City

Venezuela

Vietnam

Wales

Western Sahara

Zambia

Zimbabwe

Polytonic

Just another data point for future reference —

Landed in SIN, T-Mobile kicked in immediately. Google Fi took about 10 minutes or so before I got a signal (first 3G) and then LTE shortly thereafter. It’s fairly speedy for LTE, but I’m spoiled by 5G at this point.

Local carrier appears to alternate between StarHub and Singtel.

boerne

Google pixel 7a, so yes

IMH

I'm asking this here because thiethread is followed and visited by people who would know:

I've been living outside the US for a few years now and am ready to drop Fi. Does anyone know of a way to keep my US phone number without a US address?

I'm ruling out Google Voice because I don't want to pretend to have a US address. I could acquire a new US number through Skype, but have not seen a service that will let me port my existing number in from Fi. Anyone?

Thanks in advance.

der_saeufer

I've never had to pretend to have a U.S. address to use Google Voice. As long as your Google account is "American" when you set it up--which yours is if you've got a Fi subscription--it should let you cancel Fi and port straight to Voice with no issue. When you cancel a Fi subscription one of the options is to port the number to Voice for free.

I currently have a Google Voice number and an Indian YouTube premium subscription. On the same account.

IMH

Thanks, S�ufer

I keep reading that Google Voice requires a US address (and sometimes that it's necessary to set up forwarding to a US number), but I'll give it a try when the time comes (another month or so including a couple of weeks in the USA).

Google has a page to start the transfer: https://fi.google.com/gvtransfer

der_saeufer

When you first sign up for GV, you have to either link a U.S. number for forwarding (though you can unlink it immediately after setup) or port one in. Cancelling Fi ports one in, so that's all it takes.

IMH

Thanks for following up, der_saeufer.

I've done some more reading and Google's blurbs include several variations on "Google Voice is currently only available in the US".

In purely practical terms you're right that it would probably work -- until it maybe didn't any more. In any event I'd have to keep a Google account with a US address and not doing that is one of the reasons I'm ready to drop Fi.

So I'm looking for alternative ways to keep my US number, for occasional use (in particular, ID verification once or twice a year). It looks as though Tossable Digits might be an option.

Apologies for straying somewhat OT. If there's a better thread on FT I'd be delighted to be pointed towards it.

TravelinSperry

A quick google search revealed these guys: https://www.openphone.com/blog/how-t...u-move-abroad/ and https://callhippo.com/blog/virtual-n...s-phone-number

I have no experience with them, so do your own due diligence.

IMH

Thanks, TS. I've done several searches, most of them not at all quick , and 99% of what I've found has been either product promotion or people offering "workarounds" that appear to involve sailing close to the wind.

I asked here because the experience of FTers is often worth a lot more than those kinds of sources. I'll stop now for the sake of those people who quite rightly expect the thread to be about Fi. :-)

februaryfour

Hi all, for those of you who have experience, I have not been able to get a firm answer to this question: when I am on data-only Ubigi in Tokyo, will I still be able to text message (not call) using my US number with Google Messages, even though my USA SIM is disabled? Will Google Messages realize I have a data connection (even though it is not with the "right" SIM)?

I am hoping to avoid "surprise, here's a large bill for those text messages you thought were free" and also avoid getting six thousand text messages when I re-enable my US SIM when I return.

Specifics:
* Will be in Japan one week in Tokyo-only (plus maybe day trips to neighboring states such as a quick hop into Chiba to visit Disneyland)
* I plan on using a data-only eSIM in Japan (Ubigi is my current choice).
* In the USA I am currently on Google's Simply Unlimited plan, there are four of us on the same plan for $80/mo. I am the only one going to Tokyo, and it is cheaper to just pay for a data-only eSIM ($17 for 10GB) than to switch all four of us to Unlimited Plus.
* Lots of people text me and it would be far easier to just keep texting as opposed to telling people to switch to another app. More importantly, though, I want to be able to receive bank/financial text messages if necessary.
* I have a Samsung Galaxy S23, I know how to disable SIM1 (I even have the phone code to manually enable/disable radios) and punt everything to SIM2, but I am paranoid about extra charges.

ecgz88

If you disable your SIM1 (Google Fi), and your SIM 2 is Ubigi (data only eSIM? not chargeable for voice/txt), how they gonna be able to charge you?

If you are still paranoid, if your Fi SIM is physical SIM, just remove Fi Sim from your phone and put it back when you back to US

IMH

Following up on my last posts and people's suggestions, above, a brief update: I recently cancelled Fi by porting my number out to a virtual provider. In the 5+ years since I left the US, Google never capped my service or issued a warning.

In mid-2018 I moved to Germany. I set up local service, but also retained Fi. During 2018 and into 2019 I made a lot of calls to, and received calls from, the US. I rarely used data service in Germany, but visited Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, India and Japan. I also visited the US frequently, however.

Covid 19 meant that between February 2020 and late 2022 I didn't leave Europe. During that period I didn't actively use Fi service, although Google's servers will have seen the phone when I occasionally checked for messages and software updates. For the past year my travel has been somewhat more normal, with trips to SE Asia and Canada sandwiched between three trips to the US, and I've used Fi for data and calls whenever I've left Europe.

Short version: if you don't take the mickey, Google will probably take your money and leave you in peace even if you don't touch US soil very often.

Repooc17

Has anyone experienced connection issues in London recently? I was there last week, and phone calls/data were quite the challenge. Luckily I had wifi in most of the places.

I have (almost) traveled around the world, and have rarely had any issues in the past with Fi. Even on the same trip to the Nordics, no issues connecting to 5G/LTE. In London and just outside of LHR, I had to constantly turn on/off airplane mode as a workaround, or utilize wifi when available.

nerd

Some nice discounts on the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro for existing Fi customers:

https://fi.google.com/about/promo-te...d=CakBc_AyBgYA

Looks like the offer expires Nov. 15th.