In many of the articles on the site, we talk about a bunch of different strategies that you can apply to ensure that you don’t have to deal with dreaded roaming costs. Roaming costs were known for being the silent killer of your phone bill. T-Mobile Roaming has come a long way from the early years. In the early years, you could incur in roaming costs just by trying to make a call outside of your coverage area. Even if you were still in the same country. These days roaming usually only applies to international travel. Roaming costs may have gone down. That doesn’t necessarily mean that you should pay them willingly.
When it comes to T-Mobile roaming the costs could vary depending on the plan that you have. That’s one of the most important things that you need to keep in mind. For example, Magenta plans have very limited roaming costs per se. That doesn’t mean that there are other costs that you shouldn’t keep in mind. T-Mobile has pretty much removed the added costs of international texting. That being said, you may end up having to pay for extra data speed. Those costs can really add up if you’re not careful. Here are some of the topics that we’ll cover in this article.
- T-Mobile Roaming Real Costs
- Do You Have To Pay More Money For Speed
- How Long You Can Take Your Regular Plan Abroad
- T-Mobile Roaming Calling While Abroad
- Is It Worth It To Look For Other Options
- Is T-Mobile A Good Service Provider For Travelers?
T-Mobile Roaming Real Costs
When it comes to data and texts you should be covered with T-Mobile. You are not going to be looking at direct roaming costs. At least in the list of 210 countries that they can provide coverage in. Most of the usual tourist spots for Americans are on this list. Europe and the most popular parts of Asia and South America are places where you can expect to get coverage. This probably seems like a great deal. Until you read a little bit into the fine print. You’ll get 2G data to be able to roam abroad. Also, you can’t expect to always have coverage available.
This means a couple of things. You may find yourself having to pay extra cash to be able to navigate at faster speeds. Which is something that we’ll cover later on in the article. Also, coverage may not be as reliable. The problem with that is, you can look at the coverage map all you want, and then arrive and not get coverage in an area, and there’s not much that you can do about it. The “real costs” of roaming could include then having to pay for extra speed. Which you can do through a day pass with T-Mobile. We have a link to that right here!
As far as direct costs of roaming, that’s something that you’re going to see in the calls that you make. Outgoing calls are going to be setting you back 25 cents a minute. There is really not much that you can do to avoid this particular cost if you’re using T-Mobile. You could make calls through apps and wifi, or even through apps and your regular data. At 2G speeds though, good luck trying to call through Skype, Zoom, WhatsApp, or whatever it is that you want to do. You can avoid roaming costs altogether. What gets a lot of people that hefty bill are those 25 cents a minute calls. If you need to make plenty of phone calls, looking for another coverage option could be a good idea.
Do You Have To Pay More Money For Speed?
There is no reason to sugarcoat this when it comes to T-Mobile the answer is yes! You’re going to have to pay more money if you want more speed. That’s where the phone service gets a lot of people. You arrive at your destination thinking you’re going to have free data and texts. Only to find that your phone thinks that you’re on Mars with how slow it can get. Don’t worry though you can always buy more speed from your service provider. The following are the rates you can expect to see on your bill if you buy these travel passes for extra speed:
International Pass: 512MB of high-speed data at up to LTE speeds and unlimited calling, to be used up to 24 hours, for $5/day.
5GB International Pass: 5GB of high-speed data at up to LTE speeds and unlimited calling, to be used up to 10 days, for $35.
15GB International Pass: 15GB of high-speed data at up to LTE speeds and unlimited calling, to be used for up to 30 days, for $50.
Could you forgo these extra payments? Yes of course, but you’d be able to use your phone in a limited capacity compared to what you are most likely used to. That being said, if you want to save money when traveling abroad with your phone bill, that’s something that you’re going to want to do anyway. Limit the number of calls that you make. Ideally to zero calls if we’re being honest! As we mentioned, those 25 cents a minute can pile up quickly. If you limit your usage to just texting you may have a shot at keeping your bill low.
How Long You Can Take Your Regular Plan Abroad
This is going to depend on your plan. For the most part, when it comes to T-Mobile there is a cap on the number of days that you’re going to be able to have your phone abroad. The cap is right around 30 days. This is something that you may be able to work out with customer service from them. What we mean here is that you may be able to tell them for example that you are going to be taking a month and a half long trip. Just to make sure that they don’t cut you off before you get home.
The thing is you’re really at their mercy here, to be honest. It states in the fine print of the international page on the T-Mobile site that you can’t expect your phone to continue to work after more than 30 days of being abroad. What should you do if you’re going to be abroad for more time? In these cases, there’s really only one option that you’re going to have. That’s going to be to get a local SIM card and remove your regular SIM from your phone. There’s a chance that if you remove your T-Mobile SIM for a couple of days you’ll have some type of access to the T-Mobile network outside of 30 days.
We would highly recommend that you get a local SIM card regardless of how long your regular trip could last if you’re taking a 30 day plus trip. The reason behind this is very simple. With such a long trip there’s going to be a huge opportunity for you to rack up roaming fees. Even if they are not roaming fees per se, having to add an international day pass for even 15 days can lead to an excessive phone bill when you get home. That’s probably not the welcome gift that you want!
T-Mobile Roaming Calling While Abroad
We already mentioned the type of rate that you can expect to pay if you stick with the roaming costs and you make calls while you’re abroad. T-Mobile currently has a 25 cents a minute fee for most countries. Again, as we mentioned these costs can really pile up if you’re not careful. That being said, T-Mobile has one of the best rates per minute for roaming calls! Companies like AT&T can charge up to 3 dollars a minute if you’re calling from countries outside of Europe and North America! Still, if you’re going to take those rates it could be a good idea to have a stopwatch on you when you’re making those calls. Just to make sure that you don’t overspend.
If you happen to be on a business trip for two or three days your best bet could be to pay for a T-Mobile pass. Yes, you could be adding 20 or 30 dollars to your bill. Depending on how much data you need! Keep in mind though that each of the travel pass options, even the 5 dollar one is going to give you unlimited calls. Those are going to be calls from your direct number to any other number that you want to call abroad. What we’ve seen makes a lot of business travelers discard the local SIM card route and think of losing their regular number or having it be inactive.
The way that the travel passes for T-Mobile are structured they actually heavily favor travelers who want to make phone calls. On the other hand, it’s still a good idea to monitor your data usage while having that travel pass activated. That way you’ll be able to enjoy unlimited calls at 5 dollars. Without having the need to upgrade to the more expensive options. The best way to do that is to kill apps like Instagram, Facebook, Youtube, and others while you’re using your phone abroad. Again this is going to allow you to not step over the data limit and you get unlimited calls for 5 bucks. That’s a pretty good deal. Considering the 1 dollar a minute minimum that other companies charge for roaming calls!
Is It Worth It To Look For Other Options
We talked about how business travelers tend to shy away from the local SIM card option. Precisely the type of traveler that you happen to be can and should impact the way that you look for coverage. For example, if you’re traveling with your family and you have two kids with phones you know it’s going to be hard to get them to control their regular data usage. They get bored and they are going to want to go to social media or Youtube and watch a video. That simple act that would be insignificant in their daily lives can have you on the hook for a couple of dollars with the service provider. If you multiply that by however many times they get bored on the trip you could be looking at a massive bill.
In those situations, it may be a good idea to get them unlimited local SIM cards. They could set you back 30 bucks each. That seems like a lot. However, at least you can be comfortable knowing that you’re going to be on the hook for hundreds of dollars. That’s the nice dad approach. If you want to be more strict you can take your kids’ regular phones away and just travel with one or two phones with local SIM cards. We mentioned that each coverage option would suit a different traveler well. If your priority is to save cash regardless of what you do then there are also other options out there.
Ultimately most of the options that can be considered lower-cost options, are going to involve using your phone on a limited basis. The best way to keep using your phone at the same rate as you always would without this leading to a massive bill is to get a local SIM card. The simple truth is that using local data is always going to be less expensive than roaming fees. Although as we’ve stated T-Mobile roaming fees are actually some of the best on the market today!
Is T-Mobile A Good Service Provider For Travelers?
The answer to this question would usually have to be yes! We always talk about how as a traveler what you really want are different options. From there, each person is going to choose the path that they feel can fit their needs best. Depending on how much they want to spend, or what type of coverage they need abroad. The new international coverage on the Magenta plan gives you texting and data pretty much for free. Of course, you can expect to surf the web at 5G speeds when you’re abroad. It’s not the best coverage on the planet by any standards, but it gives you different options.
If you need more speed you can always go ahead and buy a day pass. They have a 5 dollar a day option on these passes. If you’re going to be abroad for a couple of days and you need to make several calls this could be the best way to go. Maybe you just want to speed things up! Paying those extra 20 dollars for four days of better coverage can be totally worth it. Even the pure roaming rates that you would be liable to pay if you’ve used up your data or you’ve come out of your regular coverage zone are pretty much market lows!
T-Mobile Roaming Conclusion
If you are ultimately forced to pay roaming fees with T-Mobile you’re not necessarily going to be in the worst shape imaginable. As we just mentioned T-Mobile pretty much has low roaming prices. That being said, as we could probably say for any mobile service provider the best thing that you can do is make sure that you avoid roaming fees. The fact that you can have international coverage pretty much included in your regular plan particularly for international texting is a good deal. Maybe with T-Mobile, it is worth it to keep your phone on and have it for minimal usage.
What you can do is buy a burner phone and put a local SIM card or on that, or even use the dual SIM capabilities that a lot of modern phones have. That way you can use your phone more freely without having the fear that you could potentially get hit with roaming fees. Periodically you can activate your regular coverage so that you’ll get texts, and maybe make a call or something from your regular phone. If you’re going on a longer trip the local SIM card option is almost always the best way to go. When it comes to T-Mobile though being abroad for 3 or 4 days just with your regular plan could bring you decent coverage without it costing you a fortune. As we mentioned the T-Mobile roaming costs are not as scary as they are with other service providers!