How to choose the best operator providing mobile Internet roaming in Italy (and generally for travel) in order to always stay in touch, use the maximum possible social media capabilities and at the same time not really “get into the money”. BlogoItaliano decided to deal with the current offers in detail so that you can choose the best sim card for your travels.
In our review, we were guided by the proposals of Russian, European and original Italian operators. But even if you are not traveling to Italy, but to another country, we have made every effort to ensure that this review is still relevant and helps easy to find the most favorable conditions. Keep in mind that the article was written in the last days of February 2017, and therefore, tariffs may change over time.
Roaming abroad. The Big Three
First, let's see what our domestic operators can offer us regarding mobile Internet in roaming. Indeed, for some, it may turn out to be quite enough in volume and reasonably priced, and looking and buying a special SIM card is too lazy.
Offers of Russian operators on the Internet in roaming
MTS
For subscribers who need the Internet when roaming on foreign trips, MTS has a special plug-in option - “Bit abroad”. She, in turn, has derivatives - “Super BIT abroad” and “Maxi BIT abroad”. All of them vary in many factors and conditions. We single out the main ones - price, traffic, speed.
- "BIT abroad" - 450 rubles per day, traffic is not limited, after exceeding the threshold of 100 megabytes the speed drops to 128 kbps and "holds" until the new day.
- "Maxi BIT abroad" - 700 rubles per day, traffic is not limited, the traffic threshold is 200 megabytes, after which the speed drops to 128 kbps.
- "Super BIT abroad" - 1600 rubles per day, there are no restrictions on speed and traffic.
On all three options, Internet roaming charges are debited every new day. “Fighting” with speed limits due to exceeding the quota on the first two options is possible with the help of additional services like “Turbo-button”.
The indicated prices concern only the use of mobile Internet when roaming from MTS in Italy and a number of other countries. There are groups of countries where the conditions will be completely different. You can read more about tariffs and option conditions on the MTS official website
Megaphone
MegaFon has special rates for the use of mobile Internet in roaming, but Italy in this list is allocated in a completely separate plan - "Unlimited Italy". Why such attention to Italy is incomprehensible, but nice.
Under this tariff, the Internet will cost you 500 rubles per day. There are no restrictions on traffic and speed. The only thing is that you cannot distribute the Internet via Wi-Fi using your mobile device as an access point.
It operates in Italy, the Vatican and San Marino. The charge is written off automatically once a day. If you want to disable the service, you will need to do this manually. You can connect the tariff and find out additional conditions here
Beeline
Finally, the striped Russian mobile operator. Beeline here, as always, is concise. In Italy, the Internet in roaming will cost you 5 rubles for each megabyte. The minimum paid volume is 40 MB per day. A one-time charge of 200 rubles is made, and after the 40 MB included volume has been used up, traffic is considered megabyte by the end of the day. Unlimited is missing as a class.
Conveniently, the service does not even need to be connected. It is connected automatically after crossing the border for all subscribers with a prepaid payment system. For details, it is best to look at the Beeline official website.
Mobile Internet roaming from European operators
Now consider the universal options offered by European operators, including the so-called "virtual" travel sim cards.
Orange mundo
The Spanish operator Orange has a special offer on mobile Internet for travelers across Europe - "Mundo".
For 7 euros, 1 GB of mobile traffic is provided, which can be spent during the month. If this is not enough for you, then for 10 Euro you can buy 2 GB, and for 15 - 3 GB.
The card and tariff are valid almost throughout Europe, with the exception of Monaco, Switzerland, Norway and Iceland. A complete list of countries can be viewed at the link that we provide below.
Orange has some of the best fares in Europe
The minimum one-time balance replenishment is 5 euros. The validity of a sim card for travels from the moment of the last recharge is 11 months. You can top up using a plastic bank card with support for 3D-Secure on the Orange website.
As you can see, everything is quite simple, convenient and transparent, and most importantly - quite profitable. You can get acquainted with the tariffs and order a sim card for traveling Orange here.
Important update of 10.28.2017 Orange representatives in Russia found this article on BlogoItaliano and offered a personal discount for our readers. On the SIM card order page at the link above, simply enter the promo code secretitalyand you will receive a 10% discount on your purchase. By the way, on the website euroroaming.ru you can get a discount on the cards of other operators for the Internet abroad using the same promotional code, but the discount size for other cards may be less.
MTX Connect
Another new, very original and largely progressive solution was proposed by MTX Connect. This is a sim card for traveling strictly under the mobile Internet. Sim card voice communication is not provided.
Only the unlimited Internet is of interest here, since the prices for megabyte tariffing are of no interest to anyone.
The MTX Connect Travel SIM Card has proven its worth.
So, MTX Connect offers the following:
- 3.49 euros per day for 150 MB. After reaching the quota, the connection speed drops to 64 kbit / s. Who does not know or does not remember anymore - this is sooooo slow, at the level of the first Internet by telephone dialer, as it was in the 90s of the last century. So, if you need something more than checking mail a couple of times, it’s better to look at full unlimited immediately.
- 9.99 euros / day full unlimited without restrictions. Here, like Orange, the day is counted from the moment of entry. Speed really doesn’t “cut”, no matter how many megabytes or gigabytes per day you download.
There are no restrictions on the distribution via Wi-Fi. The only thing is that torrents are blocked.
A travel sim card is easy to order and receive by regular mail. A sim card arrives in Russia and other CIS countries by mail without any problems and for free. After receiving it, you need to activate it through the MTX Connect website.
DreamSim
A very young, but interesting and promising “office”, which from the very first days of its existence has already positioned itself with rhetoric on the official website only as “stylish, fashionable, youth”. Information on the network about it is the most complete minimum, but there are also no sharp negative-revealing reviews.
SimCard DreamSim created by travelers for travelers
So, the travel sim card from DreamSim is universal, it connects to any operator in Italy or any other country from a long list, after which you can use the mobile Internet at a price of 0.01 euros per 1 MB.
Money is withdrawn by KB. That is, if you downloaded mail to 50 kbytes, you will pay for exactly that much, not more. The minimum balance replenishment is 10 euros.
From a good and convenient one - the availability of a special mobile application with which you can "here and now" find out how much the mobile Internet will cost you when roaming in the place where you are, and also use a number of other functions.
UK phone number. Also quite a plus.
Find out details and order a card on the official website
Internet roaming from Italian operators
And finally, let's see what local mobile operators in Italy offer. Oddly enough, nothing out of the ordinary, for which it would be worth patiently waiting for arrival in the country in order to buy a local sim card.
Wind
National Italian mobile operator Wind offers several packages of prepaid and contract mobile Internet. We are interested, of course, prepaid. The following options are offered per month:
- 3 GB for 3 euros;
- 5 GB for 9 euros;
- 12 GB for 19 euros;
- 20 GB for 16.95 euros;
If you run out of quotas ahead of time, you can use the special SMS request "continue the banquet" on the following conditions:
- 1 GB for 3 euros;
- 3 GB for 6 euros;
- 5 GB for 9 euros.
Want more details, check out the official website. It is a pity that the site version is only in Italian
Vodafone
More recently, last year Vodafone in Italy offered quite comfortable tariffs for mobile Internet. Recently, the situation has not changed for the better, and Vodafone has lost all the benefits. Nevertheless, this is an old and very large provider, so many will make sense to use its services.
Vodafone - one of the largest Italian providers
As part of the Vodafone 19 offer, mobile Internet in Italy will cost 6 euros per day with a quota of 1 GB. After exceeding the quota, each subsequent 100 MB will be considered at a price of 2 euros.
Billing is carried out for every 100 kB.
Read more here
TIM
Another "native" Italian mobile operator. This is almost the oldest provider in Italy with a large customer base and coverage. Its minus from the point of view of a tourist is a breathtaking, unreal, insane, indecent huge amount of all sorts of offers, tariffs, promotions, packages, each of which is also wrapped in a thick layer of conditions, restrictions, benefits, additional services.
We will facilitate your task by orienting you at least in the order of numbers. For example, at the TIM SPECIAL START simple mortgage tariff plan closest to understanding, the mobile Internet will cost you 20 euros per month for 4 GB.
For other tariffs, read on the official Italian website
What is the result
In general, any traveler can clearly indicate their needs for mobile Internet in roaming. They fit into four conditional categories: "a couple of days are not enough", "a couple of days are a lot", "for a long time is not enough", "for a lot of time". From the options described above, you can easily choose the best one for yourself.
If this article was useful to you, be sure to bookmark it and share it with your friends on social networks. Surely, they will also want to save on travel. Act :)
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