Yes, another phone question

Buy the orange SIM card when you get there. It does what you want and the price is right. I usually look to buy a local sim and I want 10GB data for a month. If Orange has talk and text, so be it.
What ever card you get can usually be topped of or added to during the period of time it is good for.
Once you get into your arrival city, find a phone store and buy it there or buy in the airport. I have always found the clerks to be helpful.
I believe an Orange card will work across all your countries. I think there is an EU law about this.
At any rate, last year I bought a sim in Munich and later used it in France and Luxembourg no problems.

A SIM from a Dutch carrier, bought on arrival, will work in all EU countries without roaming charges—it's EU law.

At this point, I wouldn't travel without mobile data of some sort. For a number of reasons including navigation, "in case" scenarios like you mentioned, wifi security can be dodgy (both for connection quality or security). I've even been to sites where there was an online or app-based audioguide, but no available wifi.

What Scudder said.

In case you didn't know:

You can save an area from Google Maps to your phone or tablet and use it when you're offline.

https://support.google.com/maps/answer/6291838?hl=en&co=GENIE.Platform%3DAndroid

Buy the sim or esim (Orange worked for us) and don't bother with offline google maps. The downloaded offline maps lack a lot of functionality and features. It is great to google nearby restaurant reviews, info on attractions and toilet locations.

Thanks for all the replies.

After some more research and thought, I'll probably get a physical SIM card before we leave. (My phone won't support an eSIM or I'd consider doing that.) It's pretty much a toss-up now between Orange and Three UK. I'm leaning towards Three UK because any support needs would be for sure in English.

For those that have used Orange - did you have any difficulty with activation, registration or support because of it being a French company?

Karen

For those that have used Orange - did you have any difficulty with activation, registration or support because of it being a French company?

We had problems topping up our Orange SIM in 2018 because the only online option was in French or Dutch. I ended up ringing them and they talked me through it.

Thanks for all the replies.

After some more research and thought, I'll probably get a physical SIM
card before we leave. (My phone won't support an eSIM or I'd consider
doing that.) It's pretty much a toss-up now between Orange and Three
UK. I'm leaning towards Three UK because any support needs would be
for sure in English.

For those that have used Orange - did you have any difficulty with
activation, registration or support because of it being a French
company?

Karen

Please note that the UK is not in the EU anymore and that may result in you having to pay roaming charges if you buy a UK sim and use it in the EU.

Orange website and app (via the Apple app store or google play store) can be in English: https://travel.orange.com/en/

If you are buying phyisical sim, use google maps to find the closest retail store to your hotel. That way you can deal with a person just in case you have any difficulties with activation.

Also a tech dummy here but I think I've got it figured out. My only question - I'm looking at getting an Orange sim, we'll be in Iceland, UK, and France. Is the 8gb data plan enough, you think? The places we're staying allegedly have wi-fi so it we'd only need data when out around the town. The only place we're driving is in Iceland and it's just for a day, plus my brother will be using his regular cell plan for his family's phones.

The price difference is 40 euros for 20gb v 20 euros for 8gb. There's a small difference in minutes and texts but I'm not expecting to use either very much. I was thinking of just getting a data card for my husband's phone but there's a slight chance we'll split up and I would hate him to not be able to make a phone call if necessary.

Kristi, I ended up buying a prepaid 12 G/30 days card through the Simify website.

They do free shipping and you get 10% off when you sign up for their newsletter, so the total cost was $23.40. I believe it's the Three UK network and the card can be used without roaming fees in 71 countries.

I don't expect we'll use 12 G of data but wanted to play it safe. And I figure that for that price, if it doesn't work when we get to Amsterdam, I'll buy a local SIM card there. I'll do a review of the card when we get back home.

Karen

Karen, I have a Dutch Vodafone SIM I bought online years ago (can't anymore), but you might pick one up when you get to Amsterdam, even if you wind up not using it on this trip. (I think you can get one without actually paying for service, not sure anymore.) I've been using my since 2017, keeping it current by sending a text from the US twice/year. I've used in several European countries (works in the UK too - it's still included in the same tier as the EU even after Brexit) though ironically never in the Netherlands yet!

You can activate the Vodafone SIM online I believe (at least, I was able to in 2017), so you could activate it for a future trip if your new one doesn't last beyond this trip. It's easy to top it off online with a US credit card. So if you are able to get one cheap when you pass a Vodafone store, it might be worth taking it home with you. I usually find that 14 euros for 4GB of data is more than enough data for my trip - even 9 euros for 2GB would have been enough on my last trip.