When you're traveling, you rely on your trusty smartphone to navigate, translate, and stay in touch with friends. But on the road, you may face challenges like insecure or nonexistent Wi-Fi and a scarcity of places to charge your device. Before you head out the door, take a few steps to prepare your phone. These tips will make your indispensable travel companion even more resilient and useful.You want your cell phone to last the duration of the trip. That means protecting the physical device—and the personal information you keep inside it.
To keep your hardware intact, invest in a sturdy case. No matter what make and model you own, you can find all kinds of reasonably-priced options online or in your local tech store. Look for a case that promises decent protection against drops and shocks, and check the manufacturer's claims by reading online reviews before purchasing.
Even an intact phone won't do you much good if it runs out of juice. If you're about to leave civilization for the great outdoors, or simply worry about finding a good place to charge up, opt for a case that packs extra battery power. Alternatively, pick up an external portable charging pack. As with cases, you have a lot of options, including the Anker PowerCore 10000 ($26 on Amazon) and the Mophie Powerstation XXL ($100 on Amazon), which can also charge your laptop. When you're browsing power packs, remember that in general, the more expensive choices provide more charging power.Physical damage and dead batteries aren't the only travel problems you should consider. If you lose your phone or a thief steals it, you also want to make sure your personal information stays safe. You should protect your lock screen no matter where you happen to be, but this security precaution becomes particularly important when you're away from home. It's all that stands between a stranger and your personal contacts, social media accounts, and apps. Some of these apps contain financial information or access to your credit card, and many will log you in without asking for a password.
Here's how to protect your lock screen and keep your data safe from unwelcome visitors. On Android, open up Settings and tap Security & location; on iOS, access a similar set of options in Settings under Touch ID & Passcode. Activate an unlocking mechanism like the fingerprint sensor or a lengthy (six digits or more) PIN code. Avoid a swipe pattern, which is easy for onlookers to crack by watching you unlock your phone. While you should also make sure no one spies on you as you enter a PIN, the six-digit code is harder for snoops to guess.
Avoid shady Wi-Fi
Going away from home means relying on public Wi-Fi. By its very nature—anyone can access it—this network will be less secure than the one you rely on at home. Not all public Wi-Fi will compromise your security, but as a general rule, you should approach the networks with caution. Connecting to them puts you at the mercy of whoever set up the Wi-Fi and whatever safeguards they employed.
To begin with, assume anything you do on public Wi-Fi can be spied on. So keep important online tasks, such as banking and shopping, to a minimum. When viewing a website on your phone's browser, make sure you can see the green padlock symbol in the address bar, and a HTTPS label in front of the address, before entering anything sensitive.
We've written in depth about staying safe on public Wi-Fi before, so read through that guide for some pointers. We'll discuss just one of those tips here: installing a VPN, or Virtual Private Network. When you absolutely have to rely on Wi-Fi—for example, to back up those vacation photos—a VPN is a great way to add some extra security. VPN apps create an encrypted, personal connection to the web, making it much harder for anyone else to peek at what you're doing.
Plenty of developers sell VPNs, so when you start shopping for a good one, check recent VPN round-ups to get up to speed on the best options. If you're eager to get started right away, we've collected a few of our favorites. The browser developer Opera offers a free, simple, and effective VPN (for Android and iOS), and you can also pay (prices start at about $23 a year) for faster speeds and extra tracking protection. We also like NordVPN (for Android and iOS), which offers a free trial and then requires payments starting at $12 per month; TunnelBear VPN (for Android and iOS), which has a free version for limited use and charges $4 a month for more data; and IPVanish (for Android and iOS), which lets you start with a free trial and then begins charging $2 a week.
Save your data
When you jaunt around outside your home network, you might come home with an oversize data bill. To avoid this, you need to make minimizing your data use a top priority while you're on the move, especially if you're hopping between countries on a regular basis.
Luckily, you have lots of ways to reduce your data use. Check inside your favorite apps to see if they offer a data-saving mode. For example, Snapchat has Travel Mode: Enable it by tapping the ghost or bitmoji icon on the top left of the camera screen, then the cog icon on the top right, then either Manage Preferences (Android) or Manage (iOS).
Many web browsers give you data-saving options as well. In Chrome for Android, tap the menu button (the three dots on the top right), then Settings, then Data Saver. When you enable this mode, Chrome will compress pages via Google's servers before showing them to you. However, the feature isn't yet available on iOS, and it doesn't include secure sites (those whose addresses start with HTTPS). Firefox for Android has a similar setting: Tap the menu button (three horizontal lines) at the bottom of the screen, then Settings, then Advanced. Under Data saver, you can prevent videos from autoplaying and images and fonts from automatically loading.