Renting a cell phone for stay in Italy

It would be cheaper to buy a phone once you are in Italy than it usually is to rent one. You'll need to show your passport to buy the SIM card with the phone. Phones without a lot of bells & whistles are about 40-50 euro. Or look on Ebay for a used one. Of course if you buy one in Italy you won't have a phone number until you purchase the phone.

I bought the Telestial one... Its buying... not renting. It worked great! My mother-in-law called us every night to keep us updated with the latest on our son.

i rented a verizon phone - $4 per day once they activate it - then $1.49 per minute - I plan to use it only if I need it in an emergeny and perhaps to check in with my family a couple of times during the 10 day I'm in Italy. I am supposed to get it on Monday, I leave this Friday, Oct 26th..which is when they will activate it = then they will deactivate it when I get back to US on Nov. 6th...So for about $40 I have the phone and then have to pay for each call by the minute. I am going to be in Florence alone for 5 days so thought I'd need it.

I have a friend who works at verizon who suggested I buy a phone once I get to Rome airport but am flying home from Florence and just felt more comfortable about having it all settled and the phone with me when I leave US.

My friend at verizon says that it's the cheapest way to buy at airport but I'm going for confidence that I'll be set when I leave US.

We activated our AT&T phone here to be used only in cases of emergency while in Europe. You may want to consider upgrading your existing phone. We activated temporary services and it doesn't cost anything unless you use it. It seemed like a good idea...we're confident of the service we'll receive and already have a number....We won't turn it on until needed to reduce chatty people...and screen by missed calls......and we won't be stuck with an obsolete phone when we return.

DON'T DO IT. We bought 5 phones used (off ebay and locally off craigslist) and bought Italian SIM cards so we would have local numbers and cheap rates to call each other. Read my instructions for finding a phone for use in Europe in Rick's technology section. Now I have phones for next trip.

Worked great for the 5 of us and we could call each other for 0.12€ from across the piazza when we couldn't find each other.

John

I'm with Becky. . .we loved our AT&T phones and international service which we activated only for the month of September when we were in Italy. This is the first phone I have ever truly wanted to have with me at all times!