How to use your cell phone in any country (it's not Google Fi!)

hi everybody happy Sunday we've got the  secret to how to use your cell phone in   every country it's not what you think stay tuned   we're Chris and Steve an early retired couple who  sold everything to travel the world full-time we   share our Nomad life hikes and vegan eats  grab our book two carry-ons and a plan on   Amazon and follow us on social subscribe to  catch our video every Sunday where are we   we are in Danang Vietnam on the beach having a  great time and you know what when we landed on   our plane in Vietnam we turned on our phones and  they weren't great no problem with data no problem   with connections we were easily able to get our  grab without any breweries and get to our hotel   with no problems and we're just really excited  to talk about cell phones it's a question that   we get from a lot of our viewers about how we used  data plans and how we use our phones so easily and   you know I think this is the most important  tool that we have show them your phone again to be able to new cell phone is just  incredible as a tool as a full-time   traveler and to know that it's going to  work a hundred percent of the time is   just a lot of just amazing peace of mind so yeah  I think I'd break out in hives thinking about   if we landed and our phones didn't work like  what would we do and how would we get out of   the airport and how would we get a taxi and how  would we know the taxi driver wasn't ripping us   off and how did we know with it where the hotel  like like just talking about it my heart because   so this is really important to me so if you have  followed Along on our story about cell phones way   back when we started we were huge Google Phi plans  we've got a video up here about how Google fi   fired Us in Mexico the reason why we had violated  the terms of their agreement and basically it says   if you're out of the country for more than at  the time it's six months I think it might even   be three months now if you're consistently using  data on Google Phi for a longer period of time   they will kick you off of Google fi so that  happened to us while we were in Mexico and it   made us have to scramble and learn on the Fly how  to manage our phones without the reliable Google   fi now the reason why Google fi is so good and so  popular is that it just works everywhere you land   you turn on your phone and it works you don't  have to mix with settings you don't have to put   new SIM cards in it would just work so it is nice  but we also found retroactively that Google fi is   very expensive to some of the other Alternatives  that are out there there in the world so that's   what God is looking for Alternatives and we came  up with a couple of different solutions and as a   team we use these Solutions in order to make sure  we both have really good data plans as we travel   so and first we we just want to address one thing  that people ask us all the time we're going to get   that right out of the way as American citizens we  parked our phone numbers at Google Voice which is   a free service from Google you can go to Google  Voice you can get use your existing phone number   or get a Google Voice phone number and that is  the phone number it's a us-based phone number   with a U.S area code and you can use that phone  number for all of your us-based phone needs like   your two-factor authentication your credit card  authentications and all that we use Google Voice   it works perfectly please don't ask us to tech  support your Google Voice problems go to Google   Voice for that but Google Voice is where we use  for our phone numbers just to reiterate the phone   number that I've had for the last 10 years is  park now on Google Voice so if anybody from the   United States or anywhere you know calls me using  that phone number that they've had for 10 years   my phone will ring it's not a problem but the  question is have you extended your car warranty   I do get questions about my car warranty  quite frequently and the um the warranty   on my furnace is also something that I need  to update uh but that's for another video   anyhow so moving past the phone number situation  we're going to talk about data day to day-to-day   data so data course is that part of your phone  that you use to serve or you use to navigate or   you use to read your email or all the fun parts of  your phone that's where the data is coming in so   Steve even I we don't necessarily agree on how to  manage your data and where to buy your data from   so do you want to go first with what you do for  your data well no I I think you should talk about   um talk about flexi room flexi roam is  a service that we both use and it's good   and there are some competitors out there  but we'll tell you about flexi room so   for me since I have break out an absolute hives  thinking about not having service on my phone in   critical situations it's very important to me that  I have consistent persistent service all the time   so there are a lot of providers out there that  allow you to buy data now for me I have a pixel   6A and it allows me to download esin So esims  are electronic or they're software versions of   a SIM card SIM cards what you put in your phone in  order to receive data I have an electro at esem I   got that from flexirone f-l-e-x-i-r-o-a-m we'll  put a link down below we we do get a referral   code I think you get 100 free gig or something if  you sign up with us but please use our referral   code anyway what I like about flexi roam is they  have plans for every country and they also have a   global plan that Global plan covers 150 countries  on their website yeah 150 countries right we   haven't been to all of those countries and we  haven't been to a country yet where it didn't   work so I'm sure there are some out there where it  doesn't work and we have a plan for that but with   with the 150 countries what I like about flexi  room is you buy a bunch of gigs so I think their   biggest plan is 13 it's either 11 or 13 gig and  it's good for 330 days so a lot of simplans expire   in 25 days or 30 days or whatever so for me I buy  that Global plant I activate it and it just works   I don't have when I change countries it I just  land and the phone works I land the phone works   I don't have to change anything so the global plan  works it costs they run coupons all the time and   you can get the large Global plan for about 65 I  think it's and again I think it's 11 gig and it's   good for 300 days so I just run that on my phone  and when I run out I buy another plan that's what   I do it's maybe a more expensive plan than going  to buy Sims or e-sims everywhere but for me the   convenience of my phone working all the time every  country no matter what that is worth the peace of   mind is worth the extra cost I spend on flexi run  but Steve on the other hand I'm not going to call   it a cheapsky I can speak for myself I think my  strategy is the best of both worlds because I   also use flexi room and I use the global plan  and it definitely is great when you're going   from country to Country you turn on your phone as  soon as you land on the tarmac and it works and   you can you know find your grab or whatever you  need to do uh your data is your phone is working   instantly but what I'll do when we get someplace  and you know we're full-time Travelers and we   typically are in a country for a one location for  about a month this I'll casually go to the to the   phone store and get a SIM card a physical SIM card  and they're very inexpensive and the plans can be   really extensive and so for example last month  we were in Thailand I had for about 17 dollars   I think it was it might have been less unlimited  data for the entire month and it was great   because I knew that I could just you know I was  downloading videos and you know streaming things   and it really didn't matter uh because I had this  unlimited plan it didn't matter how many uh how   many gigs I was using and it was really affordable  and it took me maybe maybe 10 minutes 15 minutes   to go into the place now it will tell you in  most of the countries that we've gone to the   first thing that they ask you for is your passport  and I don't know if it's a security issue or it's   just identification issue but take your passport  with you when you go to biasing plan a SIM card   and they do all the work for you you know they  open it up they pop it out they pop the new one   in and check it make sure everything's working  you actually get a local phone number although I   never use it though you know in some places that  has been handy for other people that local phone   number and you know and and it's great and I feel  like I'm saving money and I'm using uh really uh   you know the good resource in the local community  using the local plan and not using a global plan   at the time and then when we go to to before we  leave the country I switch back to my Global plan   with Flexi Roam and then I'm all set I know that  in you know for the next two or three or four days   I'm using the global plan and uh and again it  works great without any kind of interruption so   let's talk about some of the pros and cons of both  these plans so for Steve and from my point of view   the pros and cons on his plan are that the pro is  is cheaper the con is he's got to spend time he's   got to go find a place he's got to deal with tech  support I mean if he has to renew the card on the   Fly that the information might be in a different  language he's got to translate the language he's   got the highest passport he's got to make sure his  credit card Works he's got to go through all of   that but at that expense he gets a cheaper card  for me on the other hand I don't have to do all   those things but I'm paying more now I also flexi  roam also has local plans and Regional plans and   in the same situation that Steve is in if we're  someplace and it's we're there 25 or 30 days I'll   buy flexi roam's local plan when I do that I get a  new e-symph flexi room I have to switch my e Sims   it's just a switch on my phone and I use that  local plan so and the local plan still is more   expensive than Steve's usually more expensive  than Steve's ecent or more expensive than Steve   Sim but I don't have to go to the store find this  in you know do the passport and all that stuff now   um I I have had my tech support issues as has  Steve had tech support issues so I'm not going   to say flexi room's been 100 perfect all the time  I have had my moments with flexoroam it's nice   that they have tech support through WhatsApp so  that's very convenient but in general 95 of the   time I'm pretty happy with my flexor experience  now we were just recently in Thailand and we were   um at a hotel and the hotel had Wi-Fi and the  Wi-Fi was terrible absolutely awful we couldn't do   yeah we could barely do a single thing so in that  case we both had to use data on our phones well   it didn't make sense for me to sit in a hotel and  use my data which is more expensive than Steve's   data so I just hot spotted my phone to Steve's  unlimited plan and in the hotel room we were fine   now the reason why although it I guess you could  one person buys a plan and the other person hot   spots to that plan you could certainly do that but  that requires that you have to be together all the   time or the distance of your hot spot works with  the phone Steve and I often go apart or I'll go   out to for a walk and he'll stay home or I'll get  up in the morning and go you know out for a cup of   coffee and he stays home those situations aren't  going to work for us and we're not trying to do   the cheapest cell plan phone possible we're not  trying to do that we're trying to do set data at   a convenience that works for both of us and we're  willing to pay for that right right it needs to be   at a convenient level it needs to be convenient  for both of us it needs to work all the time   that's I think is is the key thing is that we want  to have that 100 you know uptime and not have to   worry about again Landing in a Tarmac and turning  your phone on and you don't have that country's   SIM card so your phone's worthless basically until  you can find uh you know a SIM card who wants to   do that in the airport I know a lot of people  do so I know a lot of people that are watching   and the SIM cards in the airport are often more  expensive than the SIM cards outside the airport   too right so it's great to have that for me to  have that Global plan uh when I need it and to be   also to be able to have that local SIM card uh for  when it's more convenient so and also we want to   make the point of Steve's phone does not although  you just got an upgrade on your phone I think does   not support esim so he's had to use Sims and go  get physical Sims but I do think e-sims are the   wave of the future for sure so if you are looking  at upgrading your phone or thinking about making   a better decision about your phone if you're about  to launch into some World Travel make sure you're   getting a phone that's got esmk capabilities would  you say so I would say so and I always also say   Please Subscribe I know if you're gotten to this  point of the video it means you love our content   and we love you being here and we appreciate  uh you're you're viewing this this video and   all our other videos so please subscribe get  that notification so that when we have a new   video you'll know and do us a favor we know a lot  of people watch our videos who aren't subscribers   would you do us a favor just this one chance log  in and go ahead and subscribe because we really   are trying to get our subscription numbers up so  that we know who's watching us and what content   works for people we want to improve our Channel  and when you subscribe and you're like that that   gives us the data we need to figure out how 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Channel: Nomad Life. Full-time Travel (Eat Walk Learn)

Views: 214,139

Keywords: cell phone, data plan, global data plan, google fi, flexiroam, esim, sim cards, what is esim, nomad life, global travel, travel, full time travel, use phone in mexico, use phone in europe, use phone in asia, use phone in canada, chris and steve, couple travel, eatwalklearn, europe, iphone, tmobile, digital nomad, andriod, pixel, budget travel, asia, mexico, early retire, retire, airalo, holafly, gigsky, truphone, lycamobile, mexico sim card, europe sim card, roaming fees

Id: zq4bu4KsT84

Length: 13min 45sec (825 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 02 2023