You all know the deal of travelling when you don't really have it all planned out. At the airport or trainstation at arrival the first thing you do is head over to a shady counter at try to buy a simcard so your life will not be dependent of scavenging wifi everywhere which you really don't want when you are involved in crypto.
At that counter you are already hoping that you phone isn't messed up or you lose you simcard somewhere along the way. For me this was already a reason to search for a phone with 2 sim slots so there wouldn't be an issue with losing the simcard along the way. (I remember days of carrying the tiny card in the corner of a box of earplugs so it was sealed off. And trying not to throw the earplug box away then right!)
Well this all feels like the past. Im trying Airalo Esimcards at the moment, and up until now it is really just working like a charm
So what is this then??
Airalo is an Esim service which allows you to have a phone connection with data in 190 different countries while ordering your connection sitting in your sofa and not at some shady place.
The most import thing to know if this is something for you, is that your phone needs to have the option for Esim cards and the phone needs to be unlocked for different simcards.
How can you check if you are Esim compatible? Go to settings-> connections-> sim card
And how is installing all of this?
Honestly this was really easy even if you are not the most tech savvy person as I am. First you download the Airalo app from whatever app store you are using. Make an account and fill in some data (sorry for the no KYC crew!) and start choosing whatever package you want.
This can be even worldwide or a regional package, it is really dependent of what your form or travel needs.
In Europe with a normal sim card we already have coverage in most EU countries so for there for me this would have no point. I could imagine this is different for someone from another continent.
I'm sorry say what? 10 bucks for a week of interwebz from everywhere you are? Bought at home and activated while I was at the airport already? And actually I am writing this in a moving bus and I haven't lost coverage anywhere. Aint that something!
So you next step is you choose your package and pay for this with your creditcard. You can use my ref code KARIN0446 to get $3 of your first purchase. No affiliate links here, I'm not receiving anything for it, I'm just really siked about how this works and so should you be!
After your purchase you receive a QR code or a copypaste code. Fill this in in the Esim slot on your phone. Change the settings to what you want to use (I only want to use mobile data for interwebz but my phonenumber turned on for instance) and turn on roaming and you are good to go!
This literally was a not even 5 minute thing to do and it works better than I expected. Hassle free and easy.
So literally until last week I hadn't heard about Esim at all, but honestlty if you are on the move this is not a bad consideration.