An eSIM is an embedded SIM card. It is an electronic chip built into the phone that acts in place of a physical plastic SIM. It serves the same purpose and functions as a physical SIM, but takes up no space and is more environmentally friendly.
It is possible to purchase, install, and activate an eSIM from your handheld device, whether it's a smartphone, tablet, or similar. There is no longer a need to find a SIM vendor in the airport, swap out SIM cards, and keep track of those pesky bits of plastic.
Before starting to use data on your eSIM, we have included below a range of tips and tricks for setting up your device to make sure your data goes as far as possible. For more information on various configurations and help, see our complete FAQ and device setup guides.
Typically, general habits including; email, general web browsing, and social media can be considered quite light use. Over a month of fair use of these types of services will accumulate to around 1GB of data usage.
We do often find that customers like to take with them on their travels services including media streaming services and video streaming services especially.
Video streaming will tend to use up a lot more data than any other service. It can use multiple GB in a short period of time if not considered carefully.
While smaller handheld devices will often restrict the playback quality of video, some larger handheld devices may default to using higher quality video. In these cases, it is recommended to ensure the quality of playback is standard definition (SD) (480p or less).
Both Apple and Android devices have built-in functionality to help in making data last longer. When travelling you do not want your data being used up for iOS or App updates, so each device type provides a feature to prevent these occurring.
It is strongly recommended to enable these features to stop any unexpected data use.
What can I do to make sure I avoid unexpected costs?
Alongside consideration of how data is being used and how much of it is needed, we would also advise disabling Data Roaming on your Primary SIM.
Devices will often attempt to use whatever networks are available to them, so ensuring that you disable or turn off roaming on networks that should not be used will avoid an unexpected bill from your primary SIM carrier.