Sim card and apps

Yes, that has been my experience. You just get a new number on a new-to-you network.

Yes everything works same. It’s incredible.

The last 3 times I’ve gone to Italy, the first thing I do is find a cell store. Very cheap. Probably cost you 20-30 euros. I’m going back March.. I hope my one from Sept may still work

I now take an old unlocked phone and use it
Also Italians love WhatsApp. I think a lot of non iPhones there

Yes, everything will still be there and should work. With many apps being tied into an apple or google acct and contacts, there may be some hiccups in that your phone number is different and things not working as smoothly, but something you may not notice.

Somebody mentioned Whatsapp, if you will be doing B&B, apartments, Airbnb, and the like, then yeah, that is critical, that is how they prefer to contact you since it is free, texting and calling will work, but not what they prefer.

I've done what Brenda above does a couple of times, and it worked like a charm. Easy and quick. It helps, however, to have someone with you who is (at least relatively) fluent in Italian. Be sure to bring a sim card removing tool (or a small paper clip). Your new sim card is good for a month (LOTS of data), has to be paid in person, and can be renewed monthly. IF, however, you do not keep it active, you have to start rom scratch the next time and get a brand new card. I suppose this is as good a reason as one could ask for to have to return to Italia monthly, but I can't do that. Mores the pity.

Rather than start a new thread (which I probably should do) I will try to add this....

When using Whats App it would seem that you could not use your existing groups as they are tied to your US phone number. Is that correct? It would seem that you would need to create any new groups using the number provided by the SIM or perhaps you could add the SIM phone number to an existing group?

I would prefer to not have to start over when getting a new SIM card as it relates to Whats App but wondered if anyone has any direct experience in how this might work?

vfinn -

You don't have to make any changes on WhatsApp when you use a new SIM. despite the phone's number changing your "whatsapp number" stays the same, your US number.

Thanks, scudder.