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davidra

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Oct 12, 2011
413
4
OK....my wife is going to Iceland for two weeks. She has a Verizon 5S. I have two questions: there are three companies that provide sim cards. Is there any problem using this phone with an Icelandic sim card for data/voice? Second question: assuming that the sim card will work, is there any chance that the hotspot feature will continue to work using the sim card? Would love any suggestions as well.....
 
Iceland: Verizon 5S function

I visited Iceland two years ago and used my Verizon iPhone 5 while there. Upon landing, I picked up a Vodafone signal with the Verizon SIM card. Once I got to Reykjavik I found a small convenience store and purchased a Síminn pre paid card. I also had to cut the card down to size so I purchased a SIM cutter from Amazon in advance and brought it with me. The Síminn network was very reliable and gave me solid 3G coverage everywhere I went around Reykjavik and even during the golden circle tour inland at decent speeds. Plenty of data for Facebook and web browsing our using maps. I debated what to buy and settled on them after reading reviews online. They have an iOS app that works in English if I recall correctly, where you can keep track of your usage and top off your minutes. I was able to get like 200 minutes with a local number and 5 GB of data for the equivalent of $15. The 5 GB lasted me all week And was on my phone non stop and only used about 2 GB. And yes I think hot spot worked to. I think I recall my wife tethering with her iPad. There should be a duty free store in Keflavik airport where she can get the SIM card too. Like I said, may need to bring your own cutter since they come as a regular size there unless things changed. Any more questions let me know. Oh and their pre paid cards were called "frelsi" or something like that. Whenever I had questions about reloading their card, I was able to contact them on Twitter in English and they were very prompt and helpful. I still follow them on Twitter today and plan on using them again next time I go back.

Oh and she is going to love Iceland. So beautiful.

https://www.siminn.is/english-tourist/voice-and-data/
 
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Thanks so much, that is tremendously useful. I'll try and email Siminn and see if it is still necessary to cut down sim cards (that's not exactly in her wheelhouse). Will post any further questions and I really appreciate your response....
 
Thanks so much, that is tremendously useful. I'll try and email Siminn and see if it is still necessary to cut down sim cards (that's not exactly in her wheelhouse). Will post any further questions and I really appreciate your response....

Regarding SIM card sizes, I was really impressed with the prepaid SIM that they provided me at the Siminn store in Kringlan mall right outside Reykjavik (I was there at the tail-end of summer so all of the convenience stores in Reykjavik proper were sold out of prepaid Siminn SIMs).

It comes with a multi-size SIM card meaning that it's pre-cut to be able to be a full-size SIM, micro SIM, or nano SIM depending on which sections you "punch out" of the whole card. Couldn't be any easier.

Siminn also had surprisingly capable coverage even when I thought I was pretty far out from civilization around the whole country, which will hopefully be good news for your wife.
 
Thanks again. Yes, I emailed them and they promptly replied saying that they now had all sizes of sim cards available, and that they assumed that tethering would work with their cards....
 
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