Vacation to Sweden: Cell Phone usage?

shadowane

I'm taking a trip to Sweden in a couple weeks and we're trying to decide the best way to make use of our cell phones while there. We are currently on Tmobile and both have Samsung Galaxy S4 phones. The one option we are investigating is figuring out how to unlock my wife's phone and just buying a sim card when we land in Copenhagen. We're not sure how much that will cost though and we'll only be there for 2 weeks. The other option is to see what coverage Tmobile has over there and see if we can do something with that.

However, we're open to suggestions if someone has a better idea. Anyone?

Thanks!

Daenris

I don't have direct experience with it but from others I've always heard your best bet is to just buy a pay as you go sim when you get there. T-Mobile shouldn't give you any probelms with unlocking if you just call up and say you're traveling internationally.

shadowane

The pay as you go is where you just buy like $20 or $30 worth of time and it just doesn't work when you run out right?

Daenris

Yeah. You just put some money on it and use it, then add more money/minutes as you need them.

shadowane

Do you know if that allows data at all or is just text / voice? And thanks for your help!

BouwsT

I did something very similar on a trip to NZ. I originally bought my phone directly so that it was not locked to a carrier, and when I got to NZ, I bought a SIM (~$5) and then paid for minutes and data (500MB). I think the total cost was about 35-40 bucks. The value of having my phone and my apps was well worth the added expense to me, but I was there for 3 weeks. YMMV, it will depend on how expensive your phone ends up to be unlocked.

shadowane

Looks like unlocking is free for Tmobile but there are some caveats about doing so. My wife is stopping by there today so I guess we'll see. Good to know on costs, I'm guessing Sweden will be slightly more expensive just because Sweden.

BlindZenDriver

shadowane wrote: »

I'm taking a trip to Sweden in a couple weeks ...<SNIP>... just buying a sim card when we land in Copenhagen.

Sounds like a good plan although there is one detail. Are you going to Sweden or Denmark?

There are subscriptions that lets you move freely in the Nordic countries and even in lots more countries, but I haven't heard of any pre-praid cards that allow for that, so if visiting both Denmark and Sweden it means buying cards in each country.

Regardless the real killer cost wise is often data so keeping data use to a minimum is a good rule. That means no auto update on mail and social media, no auto checking for updates for apps, disabling getting traffic data when using the GPS navigation, using a GPS app that lets you pre-load the maps from home and so on. I'm on a WP so the exact details on how to do this with a Android based phone is unknown to me.

If part of your visit is in the cities the take advantage of the free WIFI that can be found lots of places. If combined with Skype that can make it free to call home if those at homee run Skype or almost free when suing the local phone thing that Skype offers.

PS. You will love it here. This time of the year the sun is almost up around the clock and the weather is really nice.

Morran

There seems to be "starter kit" pre-paid sim cards with 1-5 gb data (or without data) for 10-100 usd, depending on what you want. One way to get such "startet kit" is to buy them in "pressbyrån", which you can find in almost every larger city in sweden. If you arrive in Denmark i assume that your first stop in sweden will be malmö or Helsingborg, both cities will have several "pressbytån" stores.

Link (swedish only, sorry): http://www.pressbyran.se

shadowane

Okay so thanks everyone for all the useful info but it turns out that we just had to change our plan with tmobile, pay less, and now we get international coverage. Free texts, like 500 megs of data, and 20 cents a minute for calls. The latter is a lot, but we don't expect to call anyone so it shouldn't be too big a deal.

And yeah @BlindZenDriver‌ we were a little worried about where we'd buy the sim card since we're landing in Copenhagen but hadn't really thought it through yet. We're spending 99% of our time in Sweden as we'll be in Malmo, Stockholm, and Helsinborg. We may take a day trip to Copenhagen and the ferry across to denmark while in Helsinborg, but don't know yet. Regardless, I think we're all set here.

Morran

I grew up close to Helsingborg, and i currently live in Stockholm. Pm me if you want any practical or sightseeing help, unless you already have a fixed plan!

Echo

shadowane wrote: »

We may take a day trip to Copenhagen and the ferry across to denmark while in Helsinborg, but don't know yet. Regardless, I think we're all set here.

I can recommend that, Copenhagen is nice.