Sims/data/phones/GPS

I have the same question. So I will also be looking for replies. Since we are renting a car for 18 days, I wondered if it was smarter to buy a GPS navigation system here, add Europe mapping, and use that instead of renting one with the car. Anybody have experience with these matters?

I have always rented cars through Auto Europe. They will give you a GPS to use. It's basically judyt the cost of sending it to you and sending it home. You can get one for $40 from them and they will send it to your home before you leave. That is much much cheaper than renting from the car company. I have experience with that from last year. I took my own GPS but it broke on the first day and I had to go to the car company and get one of theirs. It was three times the cost of if they had just sent it to me when I made my car reservation.

Who is your current carrier, and what is your EXACT phone model? Is your phone locked, unlocked, or are you not sure?

If your phone will work in Ireland, that's the easiest option, and if you don't intend to use it much when not on Wi-Fi, it can be the cheapest option as well. If your phone won't work in Ireland, or if you're going to use the phone a lot, a local SIM can be a good deal.

You can rent a Mobil WiFi. Travelwifi is about $75-$80 and wificandy, which I’ve hear good things about is $85 for two weeks. You have unlimited data and if your driving you can access google maps or make local phone calls. I know you can rent it from the car rental place as well and it might be cheaper, idk. I read that if your phone is unlocked, you can buy a SIM card almost anywhere once you get there and that will work too. I, personally, have no idea if my phone is locked or not! We are going in March and I am renting mobile wifi.

Travelwifi.ie and wificandy.ie. I know wificandy.ie can send it right to whatever hotel you are staying at the first night and it comes with a prepaid shipping envelope to send it back in.

Call your provider and ask to unlock your phone- explain why. This can take several weeks depending on model and manufacturer or it can generally be done by a repair shop for a low fee. Once unlocked you can buy a prepay SIM card in Ireland for 20 -30euro with substantial data allowance and use for Google maps internet searches etc. Use accomodation Wi-Fi for map and other downloads.

Google maps works really well here in Ireland and you can also use enter our Irish postcode into it (which is called eircode).

There is also a free app called Waze which is pretty good bringing you where you want to go.

Tesco is a supermarket which can be found in most big towns. You can get a no contract sim there for 15 euro which includes 15 gb data and unlimited phone calls to numbers within Ireland. It also gives you 5 euro credit towards text messages.

A couple thoughts:

I generally pick up a local SIM at the first opportunity. If not in the airport, then at a little shop or kiosk downtown. They are often in department stores, shopping malls and small individual shops (boutiques). Each place has their own deal(s) but I'd say an average offer is the Orange Holiday SIM. An average option: for roughly 50 euro you get 10 GB data (more than enough unless you constantly stream video), free phone calls and texts (local phone number). Orange's card only lasts for 14 days but can be added to after that's up (a little inconvenient because you have to visit an Orange boutique as far as I know). Other companies sell you a SIM with a set amount of data and calling that can be updated, usually at a Tobacco/News stand or boutique. I usually budget 50 to 60 euro for 19 days (compare to your company's international calling plan of "only" $10 per day, under $70 to $190). I always have a sales person put the SIM in and make sure it's working before I pay.

WiFi is available all over continental Europe. I'm going to Ireland in May. I expect it will be the same as my experience in Spain and France. I use data sparingly (switch it off and use WiFi whenever I can, switch it on when I specifically want it). After a couple weeks I've used probably 2 GB and have better than 80 percent of my data left so I stop worrying about it.

For GPS in Europe, I've been pretty happy with CoPilot. I use it in the US too but the European version is better. It costs $30 to download Western European maps (less, maybe free, if you just want Ireland). Other than that it's free to use. Download the app and maps into your phone at home. It needs no data, only a GPS signal, to operate. Give it an address and it will get you there. I've used Google maps but find it to be both a data and battery hog. If you drive without data and miss a turn, it won't recalculate until you turn data on - leaving you somewhat lost. I prefer Google maps' search function. I often use it to find a street address then plug that address into CoPilot.

Okay, so here's my question. if I get a local SIM card when I first get into Ireland, will I retain anything useful of my own phone? Will my own apps and contacts still work? I see the value of having a SIM card for calling and data usage but if I'm not going to do any calling and just want a GPS, maybe copilot is a better way to go..
but if copilot does not use data, maybe I want a Tesco SIM card for $15 and then copilot for my GPS for $30. Am I overthinking?

"if I get a local SIM card when I first get into Ireland, will I retain anything useful of my own phone? Will my own apps and contacts still work?"

The only thing you will lose when you change SIM cards is anything stored on the SIM. In the flip phone days, many phones stored phone numbers on the SIM. Phones still can do this, but most store the numbers either on the phone itself, or on your Google or Apple account. If you do have any phone numbers stored on your SIM, you can copy them to the phone.

The only other potential issue is that some apps are tied to your phone number, and may not work right with a different number. I think things like Uber may fall into this category, but I'm not sure. Other apps will work fine (they're usually tied to your user ID, email, and password, and these things won't change).

To add to Harold's helpful answer, a caveat:

Google (and perhaps others) are not being careful in some cases about changing SIM cards and access to your Google accounts (e.g. Gmail). I recommended the Dutch Vodafone SIM to someone last year who informed me that upon using the SIM in Europe, he was unable to access his Gmail - Google locked him out (unless he was on WiFi). I assume that was because Google was trying to avoid prepaid anonymous SIMs from being used to hijack accounts. Google can tell from the IP address if you are using mobile data from a SIM vs. WiFI, which is not anonymous (they can't tell it's "you," but the WiFi is tied to the hotel that is providing it, probably).

I have not had this problem with my Google accounts, but I use 2-factor authentication with Google. That means I can't login to my Google/Gmail accounts until I've received a text message with a code - and I need to enter that code in addition to my password, the first time I login with the SIM. If you want to avoid this problem, I would set up 2-factor authentication - which is a good idea in general (more secure than simply using a strong password).

Last summer we successfully navigated around Ireland for 3 weeks using google maps and the downloaded maps. All cell service was turned off. We did get an international plan for one of our phones (all iphone 6 on Verizon wireless) n case we needed it. We did make a few calls so this worked out for us. There was plenty of free WiFi everywher we went. Even on the car ferry across the Shannon River. This summer we are planning on gettIng the teenager in the family a SIM card with data. Poor thing. She barely survived last summer. Honestly she was fine last summer and this summer she is paying it herself. Mommy saves up for pottery and Guinness, her daughter spends her vacation money on cell service. We all have our priorities.

My provider is AT&T. They have an international program that you have to add to your account called Day Pass. You can call and text the US and use the amount of data you have on your plan at home for $10 per day while out of the country. You are not charged unless you use it. My daughter just returned from a mission trip to Ecuador. It worked perfectly, and I was glad because I had two of her children with me. I plan to use it in Ireland in May.

AT&T international roaming plan works fine - it's just kind of expensive at $10/day. A local SIM card would be much cheaper for a trip longer than a few days. If you don't want to mess with a SIM card or downloading offline maps and don't mind paying a little more, stick with AT&T.

Note what Harold said. If you get a SIM card over there, you will have a new Irish phone number. So anyone back home trying to contact you will need your new temporary number, and thats what will show up on caller ID if you call them.

My wife and I used WhatsApp for texting and calling on our last trip. We set up our accounts at home before we left for Europe, using our regular phone numbers. That way we were able to tell family and folks in Europe with whom we had reservations ahead of time how to reach us. We found it to be a very popular and helpful app in Italy for contacting landlords and hotels. We got SIM cards when we arrived, so each phone ended up with two contact numbers, one in the phone app and our home number in WhatsApp.

I'm so glad you mentioned Whatsapp!. I too, am so confused by the technology aspect of my trip.

So, if I'm reading correctly, I bring my own iphone 6 with me, make sure our children have our regular phone contacts set up on Whatapp before we leave home, and then I can purchase a SIM card locally in Ireland, have the person at the store insert it to make sure it works, and then use that to make local calls in Ireland. If I call or message my children through WhatsApp, they will see my regular phone number and know that it's us calling them?

When I update to a new phone, I always keep the old one for travel.

I always plug in a new SIM in Europe and everything is still on my phone. The only thing I see change is my phone number as that is directly related to the SIM.

One time I lost my regular SIM when I came home (found it later). I had to go buy a "blank" SIM then call tech support to reinstall my normal phone number on it. Changing to a new SIM didn't change anything on my phone.

Colmcb--Yes, that's how it worked for us this last Fall in the Czech Republic and Italy. I have an iPhone 8 and my wife had an iPhone 6. It worked with both. BTW -- When I downloaded WhatsApp at home and had our kids do it too, WhatsApp searched my regular contacts list and added anyone with the app to its contacts list.

Thanks so much! I really appreciate the information. :-)

I've used local SIM cards for years on my Verizon Galaxy S8+ (and Galaxy S6 before that) without any problem. Call your carrier to ensure your phone is unlocked (most are these days), and check willmyphonework.net to see if your exact model phone is compatible on the local networks at 4G speeds. Some of the resellers don't support 4G, so be wary of this.

I have bought SIM cards in Finland, Russia, Germany, and the Czech Republic. When I visit Ireland in a few weeks I will be buying a SIM on the THREE network, most likely at SPAR in the Terminal 2 arrivals hall.

Unlike in Germany (which is a world class PITA to get a local SIM card in if you don't live there), everywhere else I've visited on the continent (and beyond) has been very easy to deal with. Three charges €20 for unlimited 4G data in the Republic of Ireland over a 28 day period, with an 8GB allowance in Northern Ireland, the rest of Europe, and the U.K. Your phone will behave pretty much the same as it does on your home network in the U.S., but as others have said, you will have a new local telephone number.