Cell phone service in Japan

[Pumpkin Travels]

Hi, we are from the United States and will be traveling to Japan on a cruise next year. We wanted to see if anyone has any experience with cell phone service on land in Japan. We are arriving several days early to adjust to the time change and will need to use our cell phones to get around and for other things.

 

Does anyone have any experience with their cell phones over there?  Thanks.

[mahdnc]

4 hours ago, B&C On the Road said:

Hi, we are from the United States and will be traveling to Japan on a cruise next year. We wanted to see if anyone has any experience with cell phone service on land in Japan. We are arriving several days early to adjust to the time change and will need to use our cell phones to get around and for other things.

 

Does anyone have any experience with their cell phones over there?  Thanks.

i have been to Japan once on Nov 2019 for business for a week and my personal cell (Verizon) and business cell (ATT) worked just fine. Both phones were iPhones. 
 

Edited December 5, 2022 by mahdnc

[floridatravelersforlife]

 

Any experience with wifi calling on the cell?

[Hlitner]

You might want to look into renting a "pocket WiFi" which are readily available and a popular option in Japan.  

[mahdnc]

16 hours ago, floridatravelersforlife said:

 

Any experience with wifi calling on the cell?

 

No experience there.  My personal iPhone is set up for WiFi calling, but I don't think I ever used it during my trip.  I would have fully expect it to work though if I had needed it.

[Pumpkin Travels]

On 12/5/2022 at 3:51 PM, mahdnc said:

i have been to Japan once on Nov 2019 for business for a week and my personal cell (Verizon) and business cell (ATT) worked just fine. Both phones were iPhones. 
 

Spectacular photo!

 

Thank you so much! This is so helpful!

 

Did your cell phone work OK for Internet service like searching maps or pulling up various apps?

[mahdnc]

14 minutes ago, Pumpkin Travels said:

Spectacular photo!

 

Thank you so much! This is so helpful!

 

Did your cell phone work OK for Internet service like searching maps or pulling up various apps?

 

Thank you.  Yes, my iPhone functioned in Japan as well as it does in the USA.  All my apps worked fine--especially the Pokemon Go app.

 

Edited December 7, 2022 by mahdnc

[Y21]

On 12/5/2022 at 12:04 PM, Pumpkin Travels said:

Hi, we are from the United States and will be traveling to Japan on a cruise next year. We wanted to see if anyone has any experience with cell phone service on land in Japan. We are arriving several days early to adjust to the time change and will need to use our cell phones to get around and for other things.

 

Does anyone have any experience with their cell phones over there?  Thanks.

 

On 12/5/2022 at 6:44 PM, floridatravelersforlife said:

 

Any experience with wifi calling on the cell?

 

When I went there this year, I bought a data sim card from Amazon. I used it at places with no Wifi. Before I went there I did switch my phone from physical sim to e-sim, so I didn't have to keep switching sim cards. 
I hear Google fi works well (no extra charge). I also heard T-Mobile works well. With T-Mobile, no additional charge for data usage (extra charge for calling via cell service) is my understanding.
I use Google Pixel.

Wifi calling worked fairly well also in my view. Of course you have to have Wifi to use it, though. It was very helpful when I needed to receive authorization code via text. Every so often, however, I had to flip back to AT&T since my phone wasn't receiving some texts although I had to be careful not actually using roaming cell service as they'd charge me $10 a day.

[Lobbylin]

We’ll be travelling to Asia (including Japan) next month. I have an IPhone with ESim capability and plan on buying an ESim from Airolo (download their app in advance) 
You can buy an Asia ESim with them 5Gb for 30 days for USD20👍

 

 

[Hlitner]

Thought I would mention that T-Mobile works fine in Japan (and just about every other country) without extra fees for data/text and only 25 cents/min for phone calls.  Of course there are no fees if you use WiFi calling.  The advantage over buying SIMS is that folks can reach you at your normal phone number.

 

[WESTEAST]

We have used WhatsApp successfully while travelling/cruising as only need Wifi to text or call from our iPhone. However, it will be our first time to Japan on land and cruising. Will also be in South Korea for a cruise stop. Curious to know if anyone has used WhatsApp and if so, did they incur any issues?

[Donald]

WhatsApp works great in Japan.

[WESTEAST]

3 hours ago, Donald said:

WhatsApp works great in Japan.

Thank you!