Best option for phone/data in USA?

[Bristol spark]

Am off on a road trip start of Jan from Vegas up to Canada, to Vancouver and back down the West Coast to LA, and back to Vegas.
Duration 19 days.

I will want 4G data for Waze Navigation plus the odd call text back to the UK.

My Phone is a iPhone 6S+ which is locked to Vodafone.


I see Vodafone offer the Vodafone passport for £5/Day which then uses my normal UK allowance of data etc.
This would work out around £100, which i guess is not too bad, and may get away with a "portion" as a business expense (to make the odd business call

However i would prefer a different number, so i don't get distracted by calls!

So is there any other options available?

Also is there consistent 4G coverage through the US, and Southern Canada?

Cheers

[Odhran]

Have phone unlocked, buy 3 PAYG sim with £25 top up. (600 mins, unlimited texts, unlimited data and free roaming)

Job jobbed.

[Bristol spark]

Thanks Guys, 3 looks a great deal.

Have, ordered my unlock code, and will pop into a 3 store to pick up a Sim.

I guess i can use the Vodafone passport for the few days i will be in Canada.

The only drawback i can see with the 3 is it does not include calling USA numbers if needed.

[smack]

Bristol spark said:

Thanks Guys, 3 looks a great deal.

Have, ordered my unlock code, and will pop into a 3 store to pick up a Sim.

I guess i can use the Vodafone passport for the few days i will be in Canada.

The only drawback i can see with the 3 is it does not include calling USA numbers if needed.

If you need to call US numbers, use Skype and it will be a few pence a minute.

Otherwise, you can get US sim, which is about £30 and give you 3Gb and free US calls and texts - if you have US contacts and likely to call them, it is the way to go. But if you use your UK phone with them, you are limited to AT&T and T-Mobile (they charge for a sim, AT&T doesn't), as the other operators have CDMA networks.

In the US, get off the beaten track where there is little population, such as places like state parks, don't expect mobile reception (so no Waze!).

[GCH]

T-mobile $30/ 30 days prepaid 'walmart plan' and a google voice number (free, which gives free US calls & SMS and 1c/min for UK), running via hangouts.

Alternatively get the T-mobile prepaid $50/30 day unlimited everything plan.

Edited by GCH on Tuesday 27th December 21:28

[Hedgeman]

I have Three and visit the US quite a bit. I'd say that coverage/speed is just about ok at best.

[SamH216]

The speed on three in the US was heavily throttled back for me, and almost unusable at times for browsing. It was OK for Google maps though.

[HotJambalaya]

I'd go down to verizon (just checked and they seem to be cheapest at the moment) and get a portable wifi device

https://www.verizonwireless.com/prepaid/internet-d...

Bang about $30 on it, and just use that to connect to wifi. If you're planning on using your phone a lot use skype to call locally, if you plan on receiving a lot of calls stick the three sim in your phone and forward your calls to the new Three number.

Alternatively as said, just unlock your phone and stick a local sim in. Then just stick your uk one in every evening to check messages.

[MPalmer]

I recently went with 3's 30 day contract for £20, gave me unlimited calls/texts and 8gb data,

The other option if the data is mainly for Navigation would be to download google maps and then download the area you are travelling to use as an offline area, which is what a friend of ours had done prior to driving into death valley, the rest of us who didn't know about the feature would've been pretty screwed with no signal for 2 days to access the apple maps,

[FurtiveFreddy]

HotJambalaya said:

I'd go down to verizon (just checked and they seem to be cheapest at the moment) and get a portable wifi device

https://www.verizonwireless.com/prepaid/internet-d...

Bang about $30 on it, and just use that to connect to wifi. If you're planning on using your phone a lot use skype to call locally, if you plan on receiving a lot of calls stick the three sim in your phone and forward your calls to the new Three number.

This is what I do. The only drawback is that if you go back to the U.S. several months later and want to use it again, you have to re-register the device in a Verizon store, as it automatically expires if not used for a while.

[RammyMP]

swerni said:

SamH216 said:

The speed on three in the US was heavily throttled back for me, and almost unusable at times for browsing. It was OK for Google maps though.

The trick with 3 is not to let it auto select the carrier.
If you do it manually you can get much better coverage and performance, I think I use AT&T but it always auto selects T Mobile ( I think)

I'm over there in different placed 5 or 6 times a year and it works perfectly.

That as how it was in Florida, I had to manually connect to AT&T to get Internet. Is was really slow but worked ok for Waze. According to Three, I save £600 though.

[HotJambalaya]

FurtiveFreddy said:

This is what I do. The only drawback is that if you go back to the U.S. several months later and want to use it again, you have to re-register the device in a Verizon store, as it automatically expires if not used for a while.

To be honest, I use T-mobile, I picked this one because its half the price of anyone else I saw. T-mobile also expires, but I call before I go to the states, and give them the sim number and the imei number of the device and they re-activate it, ready to go from the second I land.

I like using these more then just one person getting a phone since everyone in the group can get onto it and look up stuff while driving etc.

The only really important thing is to turn off mobile data so you don't accidentally run up roaming charges when you walk off from the device or it runs out of battery.

[Bristol spark]

Well i failed to get the phone unlocked, so had to use Vodafone Passport at £5/Day!

I would highly NOT recommend anyone to use an "official" IPhone unlocking service website.

Ordered on the 28/12 stating 1-7 days to unlock, paid £60.

After 7 days was told there was a small backlog.

Heard no more until 12th Feb, when they sent an email asking for another £20!!

They are refusing to refund the £60 paid!

[chopper602]

If you wander around in San Diego make sure it doesn't connect to a Mexican cell like mine did and '3' tried to charge me for it. Got it refunded. You also can't get onto 4G via '3' it's only 3G, which is sufficient for Waze (which I used last summer). You can also download off-line maps with the free MAPS.ME app which I found very useful in the desert without any signal.

[gregs656]

Are you sure it is locked? Pretty unusual now. Vodafone will unlock it if you ask.