Thanks for posting.

I assume the 2 hours is on a tethered phone? (How would that work if the phone number is associated with the eSIM in an iPad?) And tethering a laptop works? If so, that sounds like a good deal.

I see there is a 28-day plan with 13 GB and 500 minutes, which I think would be more than I need in every regard, for 10€. But it's a Spanish number. How would that matter? And would I be able to make or receive calls from USA using my USA phone number and this eSIM?

I didn’t plan to call or text with this eSIM. Most people use it on their phones. It’s just boilerplate language.

If you have an iPhone, you can setup IMS to send and receive calls from your US number. Some Androids support similar functionality. iPhone IMS has been discussed in several threads. You enable WiFi calling for the US number and turn off data roaming usage in the settings.

Thanks; I should have mentioned that I do have an iPhone, and I have used IMS while ex-USA. I was concerned about the eSIM description saying calls were limited to Europe. Since frappant had said the eSIM was in an iPad, I assumed any call would need to be made from a tethered phone, and maybe that limitation would carry over. (Another possibility is that an eSIM in an iPad would have no call capability, even if the eSIM otherwise included it.)

Roamless calls to an Italian number from anywhere are billed against your account at $0.04 a minute. You can call from the US, or Rome, it is the same rate. The App shows the calling rates for the 200+ countries where they have service. This is one of the primary reasons I have a Roamless account. I posted here on Flyer Talk, a road test of their service a few months back, and their data speeds were impressive also.

I'm going to Alaska in a few weeks, where AT&T is the only US carrier with native service. I intend to supplement my T-Mobile plan with Roamless set to AT&T for that trip if TM enforces their 200Mb roaming rule I have read about.

You shouldn't need an extra eSIM for this trip. The normal domestic roaming data limit doesn't apply in Alaska, and you can use your T-Mobile plan on GCI. GCI and T-Mobile have a special agreement, and GCI actually licenses its 5G spectrum from T-Mobile.

It used to be 5 GB of high speed data (and throttled to 256 kbps after that), but I don't know if that still applies. This is a separate bucket from any other roaming allowances, but, to my knowledge, this is not viewable to the customer. I couldn't find a recent authoritative source regarding any limits on high speed data when T-Mobile customers are using the GCI network.

I have had several trips to Alaska within the last 5 years, and I never received any text message about roaming or limits when connected to the GCI network. I checked my bill for my two most recent trips, and the data usage doesn't even appear as roaming.

That's great news, thanks for the information. My comments were based on reports mainly on Reddit and Howardforums regarding Alaska service in the past. As I have noted, my Roamless service is lower than the standard US $2.45Gb due to having received several bonus credits in the past year or so. I will also have shipboard WiFi service, but that far north, the StarLink array is quite sparse according to their map. Maybe they will have a combination of Cellular@Sea and StarLink.

Regarding current Cellular@Sea service, GigSky now uses the data side of that provider for data service on cruise ships now. I tested it on a Transatlantic cruise from Miami to Barcelona last month. I had mixed results, but generally was satisfied with it as an alternative to pricy (Typically $20-$25 A Day Average) cruise line WiFi packages. Although the GigSky plans cost $$, I only use a small amount of data while actually cruising. My T-Mobile free plan is quite adequate for in port data. GigSky generally connected reliably and was able to deliver around 3-3.5mbps in most areas of the Sun Princess. This is in comparison to the 7.5mbps average I saw with StarLink based ship WiFi speeds. I bought a 5Gb GigSky plan, and didn't use it all up on my 8 day crossing. It does not function within the 12 mile limit of most foreign countries. At that range however, T-Mobile begins to roam, as does Roamless also. I always try and have both data and therefore WiFi calling and IMS voice service 24/7 on my trips. I have been using a Motorola Razr+ folding Android phone as a bridge device to keep my iPhone and iPads connected while traveling. It's a solid performer for pass through WiFi service.

The only issues I've read are when people relocate to Alaska but maintain their T-Mobile service, similar to people who've relocated internationally but rely completely on T-Mobile's included international data. I would stick to the guidance of not having more than two billing cycles with majority use off of the T-Mobile network.

Good option for Singapore (and possibly surrounding countries) - eight - https://www.eight.com.sg

After being let down by Singtel's tourist eSIM on a trip last month (worked fine in Singapore, but not in Thailand despite including roaming there), I decided to try out one of the Singapore MVNO's. eight is owned by StarHub, have online signup for an eSIM (need to 'scan' your passport, but that's required for all SG SIMs), and for S$8 (US$6) you get 288GB of data in Singapore, 10GB of "APAC roaming" (which only includes abut 6 countries, although interestingly one of them is India) and 2GB of roaming to other countries, all within 30 days. You do need to be in Singapore to activate the eSIM, so the roaming won't work if you're not going to SG first. No voice/SMS options for non-SG citizens/residents. You can also get a SiM card if you prefer, but whilst there's a number of locations to pick them up, none are really convenient to tourists (eg, none at the airport, although there are options at the Somerset and Promenade MRT stations)

I purchased before I left home, activated the eSIM on transit in Singapore, then used it in Malaysia for a few days before returning to Singapore for a few more days. Worked great in both countries. Not sure if I'll be travelling internationally within the next ~22 days, but if I do then having 2GB of data for that trip will be a nice bonus too!

On a recent trip to Japan I decided to give the Klook eSIM a whirl: https://www.klook.com/activity/10939...-code-voucher/

I had Googled some poor reviews of the service provided through Red Tea Mobile, but figured, at $1.50/1GB or $3.85/3GB why not? And it seemed fine -- I didn't do anything bandwidth-intensive but it was perfectly acceptable for email, web browsing, social media, and Google Maps.

Roamless made their changes and updated their app. Looks like they listened to the backlash (both before and shortly after the upgrade).

My promo credits expire in 2099. It seems those are grandfathered and new promo credits could have the 6 month expirations, depending on the promo.

They did introduce country-specific 30 day plans ("FIX"). The per GB rate is indeed cheaper than the PAYG model (now called "FLEX"). Frankly the new plans are not very enticing to me as, in the few examples I checked, they're less competitive than other GB-time limited plans from other companies. But the small benefit is not having to switch between eSIMs (especially useful for less techy family/friends) between countries. Thankfully, they did not worsen their FLEX prices to make the FIX prices seem cheaper. In fact, I noticed they decreased a lot of their non-European/American rates since I made my previously shared price comparison table.

All in all, while their "upgrade" was initially potentially anti-consumer, I appreciate they ended up making it right after all the feedback.

So I've used almost 80 GB of data on this eSIM, in 12-13 days. Despite the link showing 70 GB, looks like I was going to get 100 GB after all.

The speeds are very good. In Funchal on the island of Madeira, I've gotten 1300/105 speeds and it's connecting to the NOS network, which is suppose to be their #3 carrier, after MEO and Vodafone.

That's speeds routing through Orange France.


But I've downloaded videos, like Max shows at the highest quality which come out to 1.5- 2 GB files.

I've also streamed a lot of TV through Youtube TV and other apps, watching the NBA playoffs -- it's wrecked my sleep schedule.

The hotel I'm staying in Madeira has poor wifi. I can't get anything in my hotel room. But if I walk out about 20 feet out of my room and stand by the elevator, I get 50/40 speeds on their Wifi. I could have insisted that they addressed the wifi situation but I didn't press it, as I was getting good speeds on the Orange eSIM.

However, I'm staying 6 nights and my data usage went from about 20 GB to 80 GB in the course of 4-5 days!

So I was faced with running out of data, 100 GB over 2-3 week trip with still 5 more days to go.

Maybe my next place I will stay in won't have Wifi problems but I would run out in my last day here in Funchal. I shopped and found that MEO, the #1 carrier in Portugal, offers what appears to be "unlimited" data for 10 days for €15. But for the current promotion, they let you have 15 days instead of 10 days. More days than I need either way.

But conceivably, I could have gotten this plan instead of the Orange eSIM and would have been able to use it for 15 days and then probably top off and it still would have been less than what I paid for the Orange eSIM. However, data outside of Portugal would be limited though I'm only having a couple of long layovers in Barcelona on my return flight and Munich when I was arriving here.

MEO also is getting comparable speeds, so that's a good option. I ordered it from their website and they have English web pages describing the product but once you put it in the cart and check out, it's all in Portugese as are the emails confirming the purchase and the one with the QR code.

They don't ask you to upload your passport. They don't even ask for your passport number. They do have something called an NIF, which I think is some national ID that they use. I notice at the supermarket, at self-checkout, the screens prompt you to enter but obviously you can skip it so tourists can do the transaction. Similarly, I was able to skip the NIF section for purchasing the eSIM.

Hope this is a good sign for other EU countries, that the major carrier will let you purchase an eSIM online now, not have to buy and activate a physical SIM and then wait at stores for them to convert to eSIM.

Because both my devices are eSIM only, no more physical SIM slots.

Nice. Direct eSIM sales are definitely getting more common which is good for consumers willing to put in the time for research (ie Flyertalkers).
I think we should put together some sort of table for the wiki with carriers who sell eSIMs online and the ID/activation requirements, like this:

Country / Carrier / ID requirement / Must activate in purchase country? / Notes

Ukraine / Lifecell / None / No
Estonia / Super / None / Yes / Includes EU roaming but must activate in Estonia
Malaysia / TuneTalk / Upload / Yes / Can buy Singapore and/or SEA roaming packs

So just an update, the €15 MEO eSIM that I purchased, I ended up using 110 GB over 5-6 days. I would say that's definitely unlimited.

Speeds fluctuated from time to time with the top end speed being over 1000 Mbps sometimes.

One thing though, on returning to the US, I connected in MUC and it did not roam to a local network at all, even though I thought it was suppose to have some nominal amount of roaming data in the EU.


On my Orange eSIM, I used about 82 GB over 18 days.

Again great in case you get stuck with slow hotel wifi or in my case, wifi doesn't work in hotel room.

I stayed a night in Lisbon up part of the hill where Castelo St. George is. It's a narrow street with pretty tall buildings. I was on the second floor of a hotel (3rd floor in the US) and MEO really had a weak signal whereas NOS, when I switched to the Orange eSIM, got decent speeds.


Hope direct eSIM sales become more common across the EU but I know some of these countries require password registration so they may not set up the infrastructure to take uploads of your passport scan.

Earlier this year, I bought a direct eSIM from Telstra but other Aussie carriers don't offer the same. But they actually run your passport number against the ETA database, which contains your information when you pay for an ETA visa to enter the country.

Hopefully though more carriers try to find easier ways to distribute and sell prepaid eSIMs online.

The other positive trend, they're offering more data than say 5-10 years ago at reasonable prices. Anyone who used to get prepaid data back in the 3G days would remember how sparse and expensive it used to be. At least with 4G and 5G, they are offering larger data bundles and there must be a growing market because large data bundles are more common now.

Newbie who’s never had an eSIM here 😬
This is a loooong thread, so I confess that for ease and relevancy I’ve only read from the start of this year (2025). I’m based in both UK and Italy and it’s very hard to drill down through the mass of US based chat about things I can’t have! Also, I’m undoubtedly a geek but not about mobile telephony. Really, I just want to be able to do basic Internetting, (no movie streaming or heavy use) and maybe call an Uber or a restaurant, I’m not about to test pings and latency and stuff.
Naturally, I have questions…
I’m off to Australia for about 6 weeks, with one layover, one stopover in Doha each way. I use an iPhone 15ProMax (and have other older models available if needed). I looked at the bigger providers & see that Saily, for example, provide a global eSIM which covers both countries and has long validity but is cheaper than getting one for each location. Why would anyone buy a dedicated country plan? What am I missing?