This one’s kinda easy and kinda hard.

App-based solutions are the easy part. The rest of the world primarily uses Whatsapp for phone. There’s FaceTime and Zoom for seeing and talking. Various messaging apps. Facebook, if you’re inclined. Which we’re not. Email, for those who still use it.

Which we do.

The hard part is traditional telephony. How do you continue to use your legacy phone number while outside the US, rather than forcing everyone to WhatsApp you? We found a solution, but it is, unsurprisingly, a little tricky to pull off. It starts with Google Voice.

Before we dive in, let me point out that Google Fi is not a solution. It appears to be a US-based phone plan that just lets you use your regular number and Google’s data plan while outside the US. That’s true as far as it goes, but the terms of service specifically bar you from using Google Fi full time while traveling. If you’re going to be taking occasional vacations abroad, Google Fi might be an excellent choice. But if you’re traveling as an expat, Google will cut off your service if you’re out of the US for too long. Their terms of service are intentionally vague (you must use Google Fi primarily in the US), but the interwebs are full of stories of users getting booted after anywhere from a few weeks to a few months abroad.

Google Voice, however, is a free service that forwards inbound calls to your phone. The steps to get there are, roughly:

1. Make sure your phone is unlocked, meaning that you’ve either bought it outright or fully paid the carrier’s lease
2. Port your existing phone number to Google Voice
   1. Google charges a $20 one-time fee to port your number
   2. Porting will brick your current plan, so you’ll need another plan
   3. We picked up a T-Mobile pay-as-you-go plan, which wound up being much cheaper than a traditional plan
3. Once you have the new number, setup Google Voice to forward your old number to your new number
   1. Google Voice will now ring your new number on your phone when friends call or text your old number
   2. Depending on your phone, calls and texts may appear in their native apps or in the Google Voice app
4. When you’re ready to leave the country, cancel your US plan, as you won’t be using it
5. In the Google Voice app settings, under Make & Receive Calls, select Prefer Wi-Fi and Mobile Data
   1. Google Voice will now forward to your device, rather than to your phone number, using wifi or cellular data, rather than your carrier
   2. This matters because Google Voice won’t forward to a non-US phone number if you pick up a local SIM card in your current country

Thankfully, there’s a solution: Global eSIMs. Basically, you buy a data only plan, which comes without any phone service (which you don’t need with Google Voice). You program the eSIM through the phone’s interface, rather than having to insert a physical SIM card.

The cost of data varies based on where you are and which service you use. I’ve found that the best all-around service, in terms of price and coverage is Airalo (based on 2022 research). They have a welter of Global, Regional, and Local offerings, all at differing amounts of data and differing periods for use (data good for one week, one month, three months…). One of those plans will be best in each specific country. We’ll do our research in advance, and have that plan enabled so our phones work the moment we’re wheels down.

By the way, the one exception I found to Airalo’s plans is Flexiroam. For some reason, their Latin America regional plan is much cheaper than Airalo’s, while pretty much every other plan is more expensive. This is clearly a space with a lot of activity, so make sure to do your research when you’re ready to go.