Nano sim & Coverage

[money69]

Im looking for a little input, I have extensively read the prepaidwithdata wiki but my question is more of coverage and logistics of getting a nano sim.

My wife and I are on Tmobile here in the US and have the free international roaming however we will be in Germany (Munich) for a month the first part of this year and I would like to know what the easiest option is for obtaining a nano sim for her 6+ is. While we will stay in Munich it's important to note that we plan to traveling to many other parts of the country, some of which I am sure will take us through non metro areas and so I am not sure of the coverage of some operators. I should add that I don't care about LTE, adequate coverage of 3G is fine with me.

Aldi seems to be recommended by the Inquisitor alot but do they offer nano sims over the counter?

Anyone have any input?

[dg7feq]

Most of the PAYG operators dont have nano SIM in the shops.
Usually you have to purchase a package first and then order a nano SIM via the customer service.

The biggest chance in my opinion is to go to a vodafone/t-mobile shop and get the SIM there. They usually have nano SIM on stock.
Get a "Callya Smartphone Basic" that will cost 10 Euro and gives you 250 MB of high speed data. Minutes to vodafone are free, other german numbers are 9ct/min, calls to USA are 4ct/min +15ct flagfall per call.

[money69]

Thanks for the info, 250MB will not be enough for my wife however. Do you know what it costs to add additional high speed data to the vodafone plan??

Originally Posted by dg7feq

Most of the PAYG operators dont have nano SIM in the shops.
Usually you have to purchase a package first and then order a nano SIM via the customer service.

The biggest chance in my opinion is to go to a vodafone/t-mobile shop and get the SIM there. They usually have nano SIM on stock.
Get a "Callya Smartphone Basic" that will cost 10 Euro and gives you 250 MB of high speed data. Minutes to vodafone are free, other german numbers are 9ct/min, calls to USA are 4ct/min +15ct flagfall per call.

[dg7feq]

Originally Posted by money69

Thanks for the info, 250MB will not be enough for my wife however. Do you know what it costs to add additional high speed data to the vodafone plan??

250 MB = 5 Euro
500 MB = 10 Euro
1 GB = 15 Euro

The 500 MB and 1 GB options also include LTE usage, normally the cards are only 2G and 3G enabled.

you can book these options free of charge by calling 22044 (customer care) or on wap.vodafone.de (will be most propably in german only)

[money69]

Thanks for the info, From what I can see Deutsche Telekom is the same price which would it at 25EUR or ~$30 for 1.5 of data, ultimately it doesn't seem worth it.

I guess another option could be to see if I can get a microsim cut down to nano but Im not sure I want to mess with that while enjoying Germany.

Originally Posted by dg7feq

250 MB = 5 Euro
500 MB = 10 Euro
1 GB = 15 Euro

The 500 MB and 1 GB options also include LTE usage, normally the cards are only 2G and 3G enabled.

you can book these options free of charge by calling 22044 (customer care) or on wap.vodafone.de (will be most propably in german only)

[dg7feq]

Originally Posted by money69

Thanks for the info, From what I can see Deutsche Telekom is the same price which would it at 25EUR or ~$30 for 1.5 of data, ultimately it doesn't seem worth it.

I guess another option could be to see if I can get a microsim cut down to nano but Im not sure I want to mess with that while enjoying Germany.

Yes, but on T-Mobile international calls are quite expensive.

If you buy a SIM card at these mobile phone shops in train stations where you can also call aborad and maybe get drugs under the table they usually cut the SIM to nano right away if you ask them

[inquisitor]

Nano SIM card cutters are available for $6.28 from US based sellers including domestic shipping and are an essential tool for travelling iPhone owners:
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from...rt=nc&LH_BIN=1

In order to make an informed decision you might want to review all four German operators' coverage maps:

Telekom (including Lebara sans LTE)

Vodafone (including Lycamobile sans LTE)

eplus GSM/UMTS
eplus LTE (including AldiTalk, blau, simyo)

o2 (including Lidl, Fonic, sans LTE)

Keep in mind that among German operators only eplus allows prepaid subscribers onto their LTE network regardless of their tariff plan while Vodafone offers explicitly LTE-enabled bundles starting from € 10 for 500MB/month.
Given that eplus has started its LTE rollout only last year using a comparably high frequency band (1800MHz/LTE band 3) their LTE coverage is still very limited and concentrated on the large agglomerations. In contrast Vodafone has pretty far-reaching LTE coverage especially in rural regions thanks to the low frequency band used (800MHz/LTE band 20).

Following the acquisition of eplus by O2 both networks will undergo an integration process which will involve decommisioning of many redundant cell sites and probably opening both networks for biliteral national roaming. Actually o2 has recently started a closed beta test in a rural area where o2 selected customers can now roam on the eplus network. In the end of this integration coverage should significantly improve for subscribers of both former networks.

The iPhone 6 (+) supports all German GSM, UMTS and LTE frequencies, regardless of its version (A1522, A1524, A1549, A1586), so there's no hardware limitation for you.

[inquisitor]

Originally Posted by inquisitor

Following the acquisition of eplus by O2 both networks will undergo an integration process which will involve decommisioning of many redundant cell sites and probably opening both networks for biliteral national roaming. Actually o2 has recently started a closed beta test in a rural area where o2 selected customers can now roam on the eplus network. In the end of this integration coverage should significantly improve for subscribers of both former networks.

By the way, what I mentioned before is about to become reality from April 15th: o2 and eplus will open up their 3G networks for mutual roaming. Apparently SIM cards are already receiving OTA updates changing the network aliases. In case of the MVNOs eplus and o2 now both appear with the identical network name (e.g. "simyo" and "simyo"). In contrast SIM cards directly issued by o2 and eplus will indicate the newly accssible network by a plus sign ("o2-de+" or in case of eplus which during the last years used the "base" brand "base.de+").
This only applies for their 3G networks. For 2G there will be no roaming as coverage of both networks is considered as being on par while for 4G there will be no roaming either - probably because of the complexity of implementation which does not pay off given the comparably small 4G footprint of eplus.

For furher details read http://www.teltarif.de/e-plus-o2-nat...ews/58878.html (German only)

[dg7feq]

Well written summary. I just suggested Vodafone because it is most likely to get a staff activating your card and booking the right package if you go in the shops of the big guys. Some online activation or german speaking phone hotline is a big hazzle in our country in my opinion.

[inquisitor]

An additional neutral and more up-to-date indication for network coverage is http://en.netmeterproject.com/ - after selecting Germany in the upper left corner you can view coverage maps of all four German networks gathered by end user devices. Hence you can only see trails of where users have moved along but not any covered surface areas. As this data comes from real life phones you can often see new LTE deployments sooner than official coverage maps show but it does not represent coverage areas, rather a collection of spots from which you can estimate network availabiliy.