SIM card in france for a foreigner..

You can buy a SIM card for France at the Relay shops at the CDG. If you don't need data - just voice & text - a good brand is Lebara for about 10€. Easy to activate and top off when needed. They have English-speaking customer service, and the minute rate, at least to the US is very low. The other brand is Orange, which is usually recommended it you need data. Orange Holiday is good for 14 days. You will probably have to get a new SIM card for each country upon arrival. Alternately, check with your cellphone provider to see if they have an international plan and check the cost. It really depends on how much you will use it. Also, be sure your phone is unlocked, if you are going to change out the SIM card.

Orange is very easy to purchase at any Relay shop in CDG. It works for 2 weeks, 20 gig of data. It should work without a problem in the Netherlands and Italy. Easy to top up if you need more data or more than 2 weeks

Thank you so much.. but is my passport enough as a document for buying the France sim? And also, I would want more data for video calls..

All I showed was my US passport. I assume that is all you need is to show your India passport but perhaps someone can confirm. It was very easy and quick. The clerk at the Relay store had me set up, installed and working, and out the door in about 15 min. I assume your phone is unlocked. If not you will not be able to get a SIM to work

If you are planning video calls you might consider using wifi - usually free in many places and most hotels - rather than trying to get good 4G cell data and signal.

One option you haven't mentioned is using roaming with your home cellular network. Have you checked with your home network to learn the cost and details on that? For occasional use, it might be the cheapest option.

You can certainly buy a SIM card when you arrive in France and that should work in the Netherlands and Italy also. However as it will be a prepaid plan, be sure you're clear on the method of topping-up the card once you've left the country where the card was purchased. One other important point is that your phone must be unlocked in order to use SIM cards from other networks. As you're from India, the phone is most likely unlocked.

Orange Holiday card works in France and you can top up online with your non-France credit card for use in France if you need more than two weeks. It does work in other EU countries, but you need to buy /top up separately, and can only do this in the country of France, as far as I can tell.

(Check with Orange. - the recent law changes are supposed to prohibit extra charges for roaming in the EU. However, it didn't work for us last month in Germany and the Netherlands. If only I had topped up at CDG!)

Anyone know if the Holiday card SIM remains valid so it can be reused on the next trip or is it single use?

For video calls, WiFi plus messenger works nicely. As long as the person is on your messenger list, you can text them, call them or video call them using just WiFi data.

@Brad -- the Orange Holiday SIM card can be topped up and used again (even before departure), but must have activity within six months. Each Top Op is like 20E for another two weeks.

Has anyone ever gotten the Orange Mobicarte instead of Orange Holiday? It seems like a better deal if you don't need a lot of data. For 20 euros (vs. 40), you can get unlimited calls and texts, and 1 GB of data, and it's valid for a month. We're planning on getting this next week. Does anyone know if this option is sold at CDG? Thanks!