I generally recommend the Orange Holiday SIM, Also called Orange Holiday Europe, French version to anyone travelling to Europe. Here is why this is the best SIM I’ve found for European Travel:
1. If you register and put a charge on every 6 months, you can keep the same SIM and phone number for a long time.
2. It works in almost all European countries.
3. It allows tethering, and you can tether while you are roaming in other countries. (Making your phone into a wifi hotspot to power other devices)
4. It is easy to recharge using the Travel Orange site.
5. Having a French phone number makes all kinds of things much easier, especially train reservations, dinner reservations, museum reservations etc.
6. Orange is the largest cell phone provider in France and has the best coverage. The next largest are SFR, Free and Bouygues in that order.
I suggest that you put it in a spare phone, preferably your most recent phone that still has your email, FB, and passwords. (You always want to carry a spare phone with you when you travel in any case. Having your phone die or be stolen can create all kinds of trouble.). Make sure that your phone is unlocked, eg. paid off and not tied to your carrier, if you are uncertain about this, stop by any phone store and they will check for you. Is my phone unlocked? If you have a newer phone, you might consider using a dual SIM setup, but to do this you will need to have your existing SIM be an eSIM, see your carrier to do this. EDIT: If you have an iPhone 13 or newer, you can use dual eSims. Not sure which Androids would allow this. I’ve been doing a dual eSim in my 13 and its working very well. But, be sure to have a roaming package on your home SIM, or leave it turned off to avoid an unpleasant bill! Here’s Apples official dual sim instructions https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT209044
Buying the SIM: This SIM can be bought ahead of time from multiple places including Amazon. Here are some possible links: Amazon Orange Holiday SIM
and https://www.simoptions.com/brand/orange/holiday-europe/
Here’s a possible source for the eSim version, have not tried this: https://travel.orange.com/en/detail-all-inclusive/
You can also buy this in the RELAY stores at CDG airport and at any Orange Store in Paris and elsewhere in France. This SIM is now available in eSim format, I have not done this so can not say how that would work. I would suggest that buying the SIM in physical format will allow you to swap it into newer phones as you upgrade, thus allowing you to keep the same number. I don’t know of an ability to move this as an eSim, it may be possible.
Installing the SIM: You’ll need a paperclip, and on the side of your phone will be a little SIM tray, push the paperclip in and the SIM tray will slide out, remove and keep your existing SIM and replace with the Orange SIM. DO NOT do this until you are about to leave, as the 14 day initial validity will start as soon as it is installed!!!
Registering the SIM: France requires that all SIMs with a phone number in operation for more than 30 days be properly registered. Instructions for how to do this come with your SIM, but esentially you can do it all online, you’ll need a scan of your passport. Alternately you can mail a copy of your passport and a form in to Orange, or, you can stop by an Orange store (this can take forever, so use the other methods if possible) I would do this immediately upon activating the SIM if not before, as this SIM can be kept functioning for years if you put a charge on it every 6 months. Here’s the page for online registration: https://travel.orange.com/en/top-up. Don’t worry if you get texts reminding you to register for a week or so after you start with the SIM, this happens to everyone.
Using the SIM: Once you arrive in Europe, the SIM should work right away. If it doesn’t the first thing to do is make sure you have “Roaming” turned on in your settings. 90% of the Amazon reviews where people had trouble, it worked fine once they did this. If it still isn’t working, reboot your phone. Then, if necessary you can manually enter the APN settings. https://support.travel.orange.com/hc/en-us. See #11.
Tethering: One of the great things about this SIM, is that it works almost anywhere in Western Europe and it allows tethering. For those not familiar, this allows you to turn your phone into a wifi hotspot and use that wifi to power other devices. Any device that can use a wifi signal, laptop, iPad, kindle or phone should be able to connect to it. Here’s how to activate on Apple https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204023 and here’s how on Android https://support.google.com/android/answer/9059108?hl=en
Topping up: Your initial charge will last 14 days, after that you will need to “top up.” The easiest way to do this is to go to https://travel.orange.com/en/top-up and input your number. Be sure to check the “Promotions” as there are often excellent deals to be had that are not the standard top up. My last top up was 30 days/70GB for about 33 euros! Note that most, but not all top ups extend the validity of your line by 6 months. You’ll want to keep track of this because as long as you top up before the 6 month expiration, your phone number will stay valid. Here’s a sample top up valid for 1 month. Avoid using the “official” Orange site or you will get into a maze of password problems etc. stick with the Top up site listed above.
Getting your balance and Line Validity information: To figure out how much data and how long your Line Validity lasts, you type #123# in your keypad and hit send. You will get a response with the current balance, for line validity, you will have to respond by pressing reply, 1 and send again. Do this before you leave Europe as it won’t work from the USA. Take a screen shot of the info, because you must top up before the 6 month line validity expires if you want to keep the SIM active. Here’s what it looks like:
FAQ: I strongly recommend reading all of these FAQs even if they don’t apply to you: https://support.travel.orange.com/hc/en-us
Note: The FAQs imply that the SIM doesn’t include Spain, but this seems to be only related to topping up Spanish Orange cards, a different company from France Orange. The SIM card will function fine in Spain, make sure to turn on Roaming.
DATA eSIMS
Hopefully this is helpful, remember that Orange France and Orange Spain are different companies. Also, if you just need data, LycaMobile does very inexpensive data SIMS widely available in Europe. Also, if you are going to be in France first, this SIM or eSIM might work, but must be activated in France first. This one does have a phone number. I found that it worked well in the cities, but general coverage was not as good as Orange. https://www.simoptions.com/brand/bouygues-telecom/vacation-prepaid-plan/ If you think having data only will work for you, you could consider an eSim from https://www.airalo.com/. Be sure to pay attention to whether a SIM or eSIM is fully functional, or data only! One note about loading eSims into your device, it works much better if you buy the eSim through the Airalo or UBIGI app on the device you plan to use it with, loading it is fairly automatic, but slightly different for each of these companies. I’ve now added an ESim specific webpage, before you buy one, read this: ESims: What you should know.
One more option that I’ve just learned about is https://www.ubigi.com/ This is another entry in the eSim category with a slightly different twist. You download their app to your phone, it installs an eSim, then you can pick from a variety of country specific of regions specific eSims. Remember that these do not come with a phone number, so data only. But, they are priced reasonably and will allow you to use WhatsApp, FaceTime, iMessage and other data apps, also they allow tethering. I used this on a trip to France 2/23 in an IPhone 14pro and was happy with it, at this point, I would choose Ubigi or Airalo based on which was cheaper. Use “WELCOME10” for a 10% discount on first Ubigi purchase. Remember with UBIGI the plan starts at the moment of purchase whereas with Airalo, the plan starts on the first connection with the foreign carrier. (In both cases, you will need to have Roaming set to on.”
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