Travel eSIM with a phone number: which plans include calls and SMS, and when you need one

The short answer: a number is the exception, not the rule

A travel eSIM is usually a data line. Your phone gets mobile internet at your destination, while calls and SMS stay with your home SIM or move to apps such as WhatsApp. For most trips that is enough. A plan with calls, texts or its own phone number is worth paying for when people or services abroad need to reach you on a regular number.

• Rare: fewer than one plan in a hundred in our database includes calls or SMS, and only about a third of the providers we track offer such plans at all.
• Uneven: the USA, the UK and Mexico have by far the most single-country plans with calls; regional plans with calls exist mainly for Europe and for global trips.
• Not standardised: “calls and SMS” can mean a local number, a number from another country or just a bundle of minutes, so the plan details matter.
• Often unnecessary: messaging and internet calls work on any data plan, and your home SIM can stay on for bank codes.

When you actually need a phone number abroad

Much of what used to need a local number now runs through apps. Messages, voice and video calls in WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram, FaceTime or iMessage use mobile data, so they work on a data-only eSIM. Your WhatsApp account stays linked to the number you registered with at home, not to the SIM that carries the data.

A regular phone number still helps in these situations:

• Being called by locals: drivers, hosts, guides or restaurants that confirm by phone; not every business uses messaging apps.
• Calling regular numbers: a hotel reception, a taxi company, a doctor's office or any landline.
• Local sign-ups: some local apps for transport, deliveries or rentals may ask for a number in the country and send a code to it by SMS.
• Longer stays: for a semester, a work assignment or several months in one place, a number people can reach is part of daily life.
• Work: when clients or colleagues abroad need to call you on a normal number.

Codes from your bank or other services at home are a different matter: they go to your home number, not to a new one. Keep your home SIM switched on as a second line for them, as explained in our guide to dual SIM with a travel eSIM.

What “calls and SMS” can mean on a travel eSIM

Providers use the same label for quite different things. In the plan names and descriptions in our database, three patterns come up most often:

Before you buy, look for answers to these questions on the plan page:

• Is there a phone number, and from which country?
• Are incoming calls and texts included, or only outgoing ones?
• Which calls are included: local numbers only, or calls to your home country as well?
• How many minutes and texts, and for how long?
• Does the number stay when you top up, and what happens to it when the plan expires?
• Do you have to register with a passport or ID before the number works? Some countries require phone numbers to be registered to a person.

Where plans with calls and SMS are available

Plans with calls are spread very unevenly. At the time of writing, the destinations with the most single-country plans with calls in our database were the USA, the UK and Mexico, followed by Brazil, the Netherlands, Israel, Vietnam, Canada and South Korea. For Europe and global trips, several providers offer regional plans with calls. For much of Asia and the Middle East, plans with calls are rare and often available only as part of a global plan.

Providers in our database that offer calls or SMS on at least some plans include Airalo, ByteSIM, eSIMCard, Amigo eSIM, mysim24, Simbye, Voye Global, MeSIM and Sim Local. All of them also sell data-only plans, so the provider name alone does not tell you whether a plan has a number. Check each plan.

The quickest way to find these plans: open a destination page, choose More filters and tick Calls & SMS. The list then shows only plans that state calls or texts, for example USA plans with calls and SMS or Europe plans with calls and SMS.

What calls and a number cost compared with data only

Calls and texts are rarely a free extra. When we compared plans with the same amount of data in our database, plans with calls usually cost more than data-only plans for the same destination, and in most destinations the difference was clear. The gap varies a lot by destination and provider, so compare like with like: same country, same data, same validity.

Per gigabyte the picture is less clear, because many plans with calls are large 30-day bundles. If you need a lot of data for a long stay anyway, a plan with a number can be good value. If you need a few gigabytes for a week, a data-only plan is usually the cheaper choice.

Use the cheapest plans by data amount as your baseline. The table below covers the USA, the country with the most single-country plans with calls; it includes all plans, most of them data only:

If a plan with a number costs only a little more than the baseline for the same data and validity, the number may be worth it. If it costs a lot more, a data plan plus apps, with your home SIM on for codes, is usually the better deal. Promo codes can narrow the gap; current ones are on our promo codes page.

Data only plus apps: when that is enough

For a typical holiday, a data-only eSIM covers communication well:

• Messages and app calls: WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram, FaceTime and iMessage work over the travel eSIM's data, with your usual account and contacts.
• Bank and login codes: keep your home SIM active as a second line so SMS codes arrive. With many carriers, receiving texts abroad costs nothing, but check your tariff.
• Calls on your home number: if your carrier supports Wi-Fi calling, you can make and take calls on your home number over Wi-Fi; depending on the carrier, these calls are billed like calls at home. Our dual SIM guide covers the settings.
• Calls to regular numbers: some calling apps offer paid calls to landlines and mobiles, which can replace a local number for the occasional call.

How to choose: data only, a number or a local SIM

Which option fits depends less on the destination than on how you will use your phone there:

To check a specific plan, three steps are enough:

1. Open your destination, for example the UK, and filter by Calls & SMS.
2. Open the plan on the provider's site and check the questions above: number, incoming calls and texts, included destinations, expiry and registration.
3. Compare the price with a data-only plan of the same data and validity. If you are unsure how much data you need, our guide on how much data you need for a trip helps.

If you do not need a number after all, the cheapest data-only plans for your trip are on our destination pages, and our guide to country, regional and global eSIMs helps with trips through several countries.