Best way to have access to train tickets and auto Europe on iphone

An eSIM will give you access at a lower cost than your international plan.

Download your train tickets (SNCF. Eurostar, ...) to your Apple or Google Wallet over data/wifi. And then when you're traveling you can access them without data/wifi.

We switched to t-mobile (Germany based) for exactly this reason. Stepped off the plane in France, immediate service. Used service for maps, etc for 2 months. Did hit the limit for high-speed data, but never in 2 months lost service.

T-Mobile is the best option in my mind and for my type. I live here and I still use it for some of the reasons below. I have a Telekom phone as a backup. Telekom is the local version of T-Mobile but nothing crosses over.

If you want to keep your Verizon, that’s understandable. Here is my logic if I were you. But know that I am a keep it simple sort of guy. I am no communications or computer geek. I just want things to work and work intuitively.

• The Verizon International Plan is about $100 and gets you 20GB of high speed data. If you wisely use WIFI whenever you can, then I suspect the 20GB is enough. But there are websites that you can go to that will help you estimate your use.
• A travel SIM or ESIM with 20GB of data is cheaper at maybe $50 for a month. So you save $50 (or $40 or $60 all depends on which you buy).

So, what would be the advantage of using the Verizon plan?

• You have a phone with a US IP address meaning you can open any website in the US. Some are blocked to all but US IP addresses. Usually government or some financial or banking and even some shopping. Its all very much hit and miss. I live in Europe now and I run into it from time to time. You can go out and buy a VPN to get around it if you use a travel SIM, but that’s more money and more complexity.
• You get to keep your phone number. Everyone in the world that knows you in an emergency has your number. You can work around that with a 2-sim phone and …. But more complexity and if someone does call your US number you will pay the $4 a minute and the text you just received from Aunt Gertrude maybe cost you fifty cents.
• When the website wants to send you a text with a code so you can change that password that just got compromised the phone number associated with the account is still the number you are using, so you will get that text. I called my bank customer service the other day, they wanted to send me a text too. Sure there are work arounds, but .... this is easy

So are the advantages and convenience worth a $50 increase to the $9,000 RS tour? Yes, for me.

Your spouse’s phone. Leave it alone. If something happens and you lose your phone. The Verizon US Plan phone will work. It’s just sort of expensive. But you can always find a WIFI and buy a day or two of international. I think it’s $12 a day.

Whenever I read comments like these I'm befuddled by Americans' continuing to use legacy carriers with their bloated rates.

Whenever I read comments like these I'm befuddled by Americans' continuing to use legacy carriers with their bloated rates.

jphbucks many people are locked in to multi year commitments due to the legacy carrier's pricing scheme and promotions - for example, you get a free very new model phone but you have to stick with them for two years or more. Those choices are rarely made with international coverage in mind and many people don't give it a thought until they need it.

To the OP, depending on whether you need to keep your phone number, you can probably get along without using the Verizon plan. If you need calling capabilities for both phones then you'd need to investigate an eSIM that offers that (and have an unlocked phone).

T-mobile, no question.

I have Verizon and get their international plan when I travel.

I stay with Verizon because they are the only carrier that has service in Yellowstone where I go yearly. It's also got the best coverage where I hike or when I drive off the main highway here in North Idaho. TMobile has terrible coverage away from the main cities and highways.

To me $100 for 30 days of coverage is an OK expenditure. I also usually take a cab from the airport to my hotel after my long international flight day. I don't eat high end and I stay at 3* hotels so nothing fancy there and I figure it evens out.

To the OP, yes, I still add tickets to my Apple wallet AND take a screenshot of them so they are accessible 3 ways.

I agree that Verizon's prices are ridiculous, especially when you can get a free international plan with other carriers. That said, for some people, it's just not practical to switch from Verizon. In that case, you're going to get the same type of service and better pricing from an eSIM, especially since you plan on using WhatsApp for any phone calls.

You might want to think about a pay-as-you-go e-sim, which are becoming more and more popular. I recently used one on my 3-week trip to Iceland, Sweden, and Norway, and it worked wonderfully well. I have T-Mobile, so I used the free international plan until I used so much data that the speed went down a lot (I'm a heavy data user) and it just wasn't practical anymore. So then I switched to the eSIM, and it was great. I used Bcengi, but there are others.

How it works is you pay a deposit, and that stays in your account, and whenever you want to use that eSim, you just turn it on, and turn off your main SIM. You pay by the gigabyte (the cost varies from country to country), and you can use it from one country to the next. You don't have to get one specifically tailored to a certain area or country.

I used it in 3 countries while traveling, and I've even used it at home. We recently had a bad thunderstorm, and our power went out. Whenever that happens, T-Mobile service just disappears. It's partly the area we live in, which is rural, but we were stuck without any internet. I turned off my T-Mobile SIM, turned on the Bcengi eSIM, and I was able to use it for the 1-2 hours while the power was off. It was great. I will be able to use it again when I go to Germany and France in December, and next year when I go to Scotland and England. I think it's really worthwhile.

And it's very economical—my cost to use it for about 10 days in Scandinavia was $6.40. You can deposit any amount from $10 on up (I put in $25), and once it gets to a certain amount, they will tap your credit card for more, so you don't have to manually keep filling it up.

OP, just what are you trying to access when you say "train tickets and car rental"?

If all you want is the static bar code for the tickets and confirmation #/pickup & dropoff
info for the car rental, then jeanm's input is the most minimal way to do that. Print the
car reservation info as a pdf and download that file to your phone or device and save
the QR codes to your phone's wallet.

If you want the ability to access the online version of tickets/reservation for the purposes
of modifying or cancelling, then everyone else's input (and the implication of your original
question on Verizon vs Airalo) becomes valid as you need internet access to do that.

Obviously there are lots of questions about mobile data access related to many uses/purposes,
but your question was about tickets.