How to avoid excessive roaming charges while you are on holiday? Easy, just get a prepaid plan from Holiday eSIM and avoid paying any altogether!

Holiday eSIM prepaid plans give you immunity from paying any kind of roaming charges. With our prepaid eSIM plans for Europe, Asia, Africa, North and South America, and Oceania, you can be anywhere in the world and access high-speed mobile Internet in minutes with us.

While we could conclude this post with those two paragraphs, there may be some among you who may need extra convincing. So, let’s look at some of the common pitfalls associated with data roaming charges and how you can avoid them.

What is data roaming? 

Let's start with the basics: What exactly is data roaming? You've probably heard this term mentioned in your mobile carrier's data plans, but what does it mean?

In the simplest terms, it is what keeps your phone functional even when you’re outside of the range of your carrier’s network. When you’re not on Wi-Fi, your carrier provides data to your smartphone to keep you connected. However, your carrier will not be able to keep you connected across the world.

This is where data roaming comes into play, as it enables your phone to switch to another network temporarily based on agreements between your carrier and other networks. But this comes at a potentially steep cost. 

How much does international roaming cost? 

Now that we've established what data roaming is, let's address the inevitable question: What are the costs associated with it? Unfortunately, data roaming is rarely included for free as part of your standard data plan.

If you desire unlimited roaming, you'll likely need to opt for one of the more expensive plans offered by your carrier. Roaming charges can vary significantly from one carrier to another.

In most cases, if you haven't subscribed to unlimited roaming, you'll be billed based on your usage. These charges can quickly accumulate and take you by surprise.

The truth about unlimited international roaming

Although unlimited data sounds like an attractive proposition, you will almost always end up paying for sub-par network quality and poor network speeds.

If you read the fine print, you would see that you would be getting 2G speeds. In 2023, if you’re seriously thinking about staying connected on 2G connection speeds, you’re in for a surprise as you are only going to get network speeds of up to 256kbps while on a 2G connection. This equates to a painfully slow network experience.

Breaking down international roam charges

Regarding normal roaming charges, you may end up paying anywhere between $2.05 to $10.25 per megabyte of data while you are on some carriers.

You’ve read that right! To put this into perspective, let’s take a look at how much data YouTube takes for an hour of streaming video.

For a 240p video, YouTube consumes around 225MB per hour. Now, apply that to the earlier per MB rate associated with the plan and you would end up paying around $500 just for watching an hour of grainy footage.

When you consider this, all those stories about people coming back home from vacations to cell phone bills in the range of thousands of dollars start to make sense. Look around, and you will find that the Internet is full of similar horror stories.

Before we move on, let’s explore how much you would end up paying if you were on a Holiday eSIM prepaid plan.

With our 50GB eSIM Europe, you are effectively paying about $1 for a GB. This makes it 1000 times more affordable than sticking with roaming charges discussed in the post mentioned previously!

How to avoid international roaming charges?

The suggested ways to avoid paying roaming charges, accidentally or otherwise, range from putting your phone constantly in Airplane Mode to hilarious suggestions to leave your phone at home and enjoy your vacation instead!

But what if enjoying your vacation also depends on making sure all your things get done? These days, it is hard for people to switch off and go off the grid.

Additionally, your provider may give you the option to sign up for roaming charge alerts. They could notify you when your data usage starts to go up.

However, you should know that this can prove even more stressful than constantly switching Airplane Mode on and off. Given the nature of modern apps and the associated background transfers related to each, you would be racking up data usage even without you knowing about it.

Also, how would you know about the alerts when you’re asleep?

Therefore, applying defensive strategies like these is ultimately not worth it.

The logical solution here is to buy an international eSIM with extensive worldwide coverage.

In short, with our eSIM, you will pay zero roaming charges and experience 4G or 5G data speeds nearly anywhere around the world. This is in addition to low per GB rates ranging between $4 to $5 on average.

Moreover, if you have your itinerary mapped out, you can opt for regional eSIMs, like Holiday eSIM Europe or Holiday eSIM Thailand, which has ridiculously low rates ranging from $1 to $0.5 per GB.

The best eSIMs for international roaming

Buy Holiday eSIM World

Key features

  • Price: $44.10

  • Data: 10GB 4G data

  • Service speed: 4G/LTE

  • Network: Orange

  • Service coverage: Works in 190 countries. See countries coverage on the product page for more details

  • Tethering/Wi-Fi hotspot: Allowed

  • Credit validity: 14 days

  • Phone number: This eSIM does not include a phone number

 

Buy AIS Holiday World eSIM

Key features

  • Price: $37.79

  • Data: 6GB data / Unlimited 2G data

  • Service speed: 5G/4G

  • Network: AIS

  • Service coverage: Works in 120 countries. See countries coverage on the product page for more details

  • Credit validity: 15 days

  • Phone number: This eSIM card comes with a Thai phone number.

Avoid international roaming charges without eSIM

If you are still not convinced about getting an eSIM but want to avoid roaming charges, you can do the following to save yourself from having to break the bank to pay the phone bills.

Turning off roaming on Android

  • Open the "Settings" app.

  • Navigate to "Network & Internet."

  • Select "SIM."

  • Toggle off "Roaming."

Turning off roaming on Samsung

  • Open the "Settings" app

  • Go to "Connections"

  • Choose "Mobile Networks"

  • Toggle off "Data Roaming"

Turning off roaming on iPhone

  • Launch the "Settings" app

  • Scroll down and select "Cellular"

  • Tap "Cellular Data Options"

  • Toggle off "Data Roaming"

Conclusion – Buy Holiday eSIM World

Ultimately, data roaming is something we are not concerned with during our day-to-day lives. But it is a major factor whenever we step outside our home country. That’s why we highly recommend signing up for one of our prepaid plans if you’ve got international travel on your mind.

With just a minute needed to set up, and great affordability, you will be getting a premium experience in all of your connectivity. Choose Holiday eSIM today and discover how radically it can transform your travel experience.