I found Airalo about 1.5 years ago on my honeymoon to Indonesia, as I can no longer use local (non-tourist) Indonesian SIM card with my foreign-bought phone. That’s when I decided to give Airalo, the popular eSIM service, a try. Since then, my family has tried it in 7 countries: Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Qatar, US, New Zealand and Turkey. TL;DR, I think Airalo can be great, but when it doesn’t work, the customer service is not the greatest. Continue reading to hear my story, and decide for yourself whether to use Airalo or not!
How Does Airalo Work?
TL;DR from Airalo blog, Airalo is an eSIM service that provides mobile data plans while allowing you to avoid traditional SIM cards. It’s apparently available in over 200 countries, so that’s pretty good coverage. After downloading the Airalo app, simply choose a plan for your destination, purchase the eSIM, and follow easy instructions to activate it via a QR code (or manual input). This lets you stay connected instantly without the hassle of buying a physical SIM locally. It’s a great solution for seamless data access during your travels as you can pretty much use it as the plane lands. As it is probably obvious by now, you can only use Airalo if you own a phone that supports eSIM. A quick Google should help you to figure that out in about 10 seconds!
Is Airalo Good/Legit?
I think Airalo is pretty good and legit. It definitely worked for me and my parents always, but for some reasons quite intermittent for my sister. Here’s the breakdown per country:
- Indonesia: I used Airalo in September 2023 while visiting Bali and Komodo Islands. Bali is obviously a very popular place, but I was a bit nervous as Komodo Islands is quite remote still. I had a very good reception pretty much across Ubud and southern Bali where most tourists are (Nusa Dua/Sanur/Uluwatu etc). I was more surprised that I had quite good reception in Labuan Bajo, though when we were sailing for 3 days across Komodo National Park on this beautiful Phinisi boat then we didn’t have any reception. I don’t think anyone else have any reception though.
- Singapore: I had good reception in Singapore, but yeah it’s a tiny island with absolute maximum connectivity, so I don’t think ANYONE can ever have a bad reception in Singapore. Complete opposite from Komodo Islands really.
- Turkey: I used Airalo in Turkey for 2-3 days during a stopover to Bulgaria. No problems at all. (if you are wondering as a female traveller how safe Istanbul is – here’s my experience)
- Doha, Qatar: my parents and sister went to Dubai. Funnily enough, it worked completely fine for my Mum and Dad (Samsung S22 and Samsung A20 if you are wondering) – but doesn’t work at all for my sister! It worked for her in Indonesia previously, but doesn’t work in Doha. Funnily enough a blogger said that it worked for her in Qatar, but not in South Africa!
- Malaysia: same story as above. Worked wonderfully for my parents and didn’t work for my sister. She contacted customer service but they weren’t very helpful. We’ll talk about it in detail in the next section!
- USA: I did use it, but not that much as my transit was only for a few hours and I didn’t end up leaving the airport due to LA wildfire. It was fine when I used it in the plane and before we take off while I was in the plane though, in LAX airport.
- New Zealand: I’ve just used it recently for a full month in New Zealand, just as we moved to New Zealand. In fact, it’s cheaper per month than most providers here! New Zealand has some insane cost of living. I’ve used it to travel around quite a bit (mostly day trips from Hamilton) and it’s mostly fine. It uses One NZ network which is a big network provider here.
Airalo Customer Service – Our Experience
My sister, understandably, did contact customer service to complains about the eSIM not working. They asked her to do a thorough check to investigate whether the issue is from her end or from Airalo end. They did TWO HOURS of going back and forth – they asked her to go on flight mode, wait for10 minutes, restart, then turn off flight move like at least 5 times). After all those faff, they STILL refused to do a full refund on the grounds that they can’t establish the fault is with Airalo!! It was quite infuriating actually.
The only option, as you can see from the screenshot below, is to return as an Airmoney or Airalo credits. Which in this case is fine as she just bought credits for me and I pay her back – but yeah it was pretty impossible to get them to agree on a full refund. The customer service also suggested she bought another eSIM – like hello the one I just bought didn’t work – why did you think buying another one would help??
So yeah from the sounds of it – when things go bad, it can be quite difficult to figure it out.
How to Get the Most Out of Airalo
Some tips from me:
- Make sure you’ve checked that your phone supports eSIM before purchasing a plan!
- Check the network provider – see screenshot below. They mostly do, but make sure the network they use is a major provider and not some obscure one (you can Google this information)
- Use them when you need ONLY data – you can’t use Airalo to call or standard text (of course you can use WhatsApp etc that relies on data)
- Don’t buy too many eSIM in advance – buy one, and if it stopped working then hopefully you haven’t wasted a big amount of money or get £25 worth in credit like my sister does!
- Compare the price with local SIM – some cheaper areas such as South East Asian countries, you may be able to get cheaper local SIM compared to Airalo. When I went to India, I figured out it was cheaper to use Lebara from the UK, which has free roaming in India.
Airalo Pricing – Is Airalo Cheap?
I find Airalo to be generally affordable, especially if you don’t need a massive amount of data. However, I also live in the UK, so it’s kind of skewed that way. It’s definitely cheaper for me compared to just do roaming, if my network provider doesn’t have a free roaming or discounted roaming in place. So I’d say do your research! However – taking into account the convenience and not wasting any time to go to the store etc – I will choose Airalo most of the time anyway.
Should I Install Airalo eSIM Before Travelling?
You can, but you don’t have to. I typically do but only because I am a nervous human being. I find it helpful to send the screenshot of the QR code to my husband or someone I am travelling with. It’s just easier then to scan it. You do need network to install the QR code – that’s why I try to install it before I travel. However it is EXTREMELY important that you do NOT delete the eSIM before you’re done with them completely. Once you delete the eSIM, you can’t reinstall it again. So be careful!
Is Airalo Safe?
Yeah, as far as I can tell Airalo is safe. I can’t see any safety concerns with it. Airalo is a legitimate company as far as I can tell. I’ve used them for about 1.5 years, personally with minimal issues though some other people do have issues with them. They are an incorporated US company but have major hubs in Turkey, Toronto and operational base in Singapore.
Would I use Airalo Again? The Verdict
I’d 100% use Airalo again. I wouldn’t put so much credit on it or buy so many packages at once – but I’ll buy a phone plan just before I get to a country. I’m going to Malaysia next week and planning to use Airalo again, I’ll let you know how it goes!
If you want to try it out – feel free to use my referral code ANASTA2001 to get $3 off or use my referral link here. Happy travels – do let me know in the comment how you find it!
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