Have you ever heard of
KnowRoaming?
If you travel internationally and have ever:
- Had an outrageous mobile phone bill or
- Avoided using your phone to mitigate having an outrageous bill
you are going to want to continue reading. Historically we have done one of a couple things when traveling:
- Buy an expensive (and limited) international phone plan
- Turn roaming off on our phones/put them on airplane mode and only use them on wifi
- Bought SIM cards locally and had to deal with going to telecom providers, deal with a language barrier, and hope the SIM card has enough data for our time there.
There are problems with each of these approaches:
- As noted above, it’s expensive
- Living without mobile phones was easy before we had them. Living without them after having been so reliant upon them for the last 15 years is a bit harder. Simple things like walking directions on Google Maps won’t work without data or wifi. These come in quite handy while trying to find a hole in the wall restaurant in a foreign town.
- You tend to have to over purchase data that you end up not able to use. The plans tend to last only 30 days, and the surplus credit is wasted after your month is up.
So we had been looking for an option that made financial sense as well as practical sense for our needs. What we found was KnowRoaming.
KnowRoaming aims to reduce roaming fees while traveling. Their model enables travelers to access the internet and make phone calls in virtually every country in the world. We have pushed this to the LIMIT, using their services without issue in countries such as Thailand, Laos, Italy, etc.
How KnowRoaming Works
Based on our years of experience and exposure to cellular networks in over 30 countries, we have determined that KnowRoaming is without a doubt the best international solution, especially when you’re looking for a multinational solution.
KnowRoaming has 2 international options:
- A sticker that attaches to your own SIM card (some carriers aren’t compatible)
- An international SIM card that you put in your personal mobile phone
- We opted for this option as we use Verizon in the US. Verizon is not compatible with the sticker. Carriers such as AT&T are.
Decide how much money you want to load onto the SIM card
The amazing thing about KnowRoaming is that your credit works in every country that KnowRoaming works (yeah, pretty much every country in the world) and currency isn’t an issue. If you load, let’s say $100, onto your account but only use $50 on a trip to Italy, you’ll have $50 to use on your next trip to Bora Bora. Do note the credit expires after 15-months. All the more reason to go internationally at least once every year!
KnowRoaming has zero impact on your mobile provider at home
If you’re using the sticker, you don’t have to worry about interference. If you’re using the SIM card, you simply change it out with your usual SIM card when you leave the country. We personally keep the KnowRoaming cards between the back of our phones and our phone cases so that we always have them with us when we go abroad.
KnowRoaming has a user-friendly app
The app enables the user to connect to the KnowRoaming network, monitor and add credit, turn the service on and off, etc. The app also breaks down the rates incurred in each country. As you can see in the image above, KnowRoaming is smart enough to know that we are at home right now. You’ll also notice that the credit sits there for our next trip.
Unlimited data plan
For $7.99 per day, you can access unlimited data through KnowRoaming. This is a great option if you’re big on social media. Facebook, Instagram, etc. tend to eat through the credit significantly more quickly than phone calls.
Times we don’t use KnowRoaming
As you guys know, we spend prolonged periods of time in Italy. On our longer trips (where we stay for a period of months) it makes more sense to get a local SIM card from one of the providers such as Vodafone, TIM, or Wind.
Order now and you’ll get 50% off with our code CCSAVE50. Visit KnowRoaming for more! Happy Travels.