While planning for Turkey Trip, one of the biggest concerns I had was availability of unlimited/uninterrupted internet with good speed in reasonable price.
The reasons were:
- I had planned the whole trip at my own, using internet, without the help of any travel agency thus if anything went wrong my source of help was internet alone.
- For traveling inside Istanbul I had planned to use Local Transportation and to see maximum places in limited time, smooth transition from one place to another was necessary or else I would have wasted a lot of time just waiting for buses/trains. This required using apps which share real time schedule of local transportation.
- I had also planned not to take any audio guide or actual guide for watching any attraction, instead I had downloaded some apps which provide information about the attractions and audio tours.
- I had planned to ‘Check-In’ in places so that I could have a record to refer to later on and so that people following my trip can stay updated.
- Outside Istanbul I had planned to use Rent a Car and thus for Navigation I required Internet. (Later I got to know that Google Maps Navigation doesn’t work in Turkey or atleast it didn’t work for me)
- In case there was an urgent work from office, I could work remotely.
I tried to search for various options and found the following: (You can skip these and can directly move to Option # 7 if you are only interested in the option I opted to use)
1. Roaming Package on my existing STC SIM:
- SR24, 100MB, 24 Hours
- SR99, 1GB, 7 Days
- SR250, 2GB, 30 Days
- Roaming on AVEA and Vodafone
- SR 250 for 30 days was a good deal for me but I was not too sure about 2GB limit, specially considering navigation requires good amount of internet.
- Also when I took STC Roaming Package in UAE, it didn’t allow me to use Hotspot on my mobile so it was pretty useless.
2. New Avea SIM:
- SIM card is up to 50 TL with 20 TL Credit
- 1GB Data Package in 19 TL
- It looked pretty reasonable in price but upon reading further I came to know that to use a Turkish SIM you need a Turkish Mobile Set, if you use it on your non Turkish Mobile Set then it will get blocked sooner or later. My dependence on internet didn’t allow me to take this risk.
| |  | | | 1 GB Data Package 1 GB DATA PACKAGE offers 1 GB mobile internet on your device for a cost of TRY 19! | | | | | | | | |  | | | | | | | |
3. New fenercell SIM:
- 23 TL: All Directions 500 Minutes + All Directions 5000 SM + 2GB mobile internet
- Issue in buying a Turkish SIM was the same as mentioned above.
| | | | | | Fenercell Süper Fırsat Paketi - Fenercell Her yöne 500 dakika, her yöne 5.000 SMS, 2 GB’lık her şey dahil paket ayda sadece 23 TL! Üstelik hem faturalı hem de faturasız! | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
4. New Vodafone SIM:
5. An article which gave me good info about Data SIMs in Turkey:
| |  | | | Data SIM in Turkey Turkey is a very complicated country to buy a local SIM card, because there are a lot of legal restrictions. Generally, you can buy a local SIM showing your passport in a store. But this has a lot of consequences: All mobiles phones purchased outsi… | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
6. RentnConnect:
- Although I had thought about ‘rent a myfi device with internet’ concept long back in 2011, I was visiting Pakistan on Vacations for a few weeks and it was quite expensive to arrange a high speed mobile internet at that time so I suggested my friend working in PTCL to launch such a service. Not sure if he gave it a real thought but I was glad to see such services now available in Turkey.
- Although it is a very convenient service but it is not cheap. There was a 10% discount code available as well, not sure if its still working but you can try your luck: 3P2015NY
- You can read more about it on the link below:
| |  | | | How it works - Rent 'n Connect You Book Reserve your device of choice on this website for the dates you wish to have it or throughout your stay in Turkey Click here to view | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
7. Alldaywifi (the service I opted to use):
| |  | | | Alldaywifi | Mobile WiFi 3G Internet in Turkey | mifi pocket wifi rental sim card data roaming portable prepaid hotspot istanbul You can rent a 3G Mobile WiFi Hotspot, and get connected to the internet in Turkey instantly. During your whole trip, carry it in your pocket or bag, and enjoy the fast internet connection with up to 10 devices at the same time, for a price of one.… | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
- It is a similar service to RentnConnect but relatively cheaper and with very good reviews on TripAdvisor. Thus I contacted them on their FB page. They responded after 4 days, which didn’t give a good 1st impression. They responded next query the same day but for the last query I didn’t get a response at all. Later I came to know that email is a better option to contact them.
| |  | | | Nauman Khan - Hi, I m planning to visit Turkey from 19th... | Facebook Hi, I m planning to visit Turkey from 19th Feb to 14th March (3 weeks), I would like to know if you have any special offers, thanks. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
- I did online booking for 3 weeks and paid through Paypal. After making the reservation I emailed them and asked the same query through email, this time I got an immediate response. I informed my hotel and before I had even left Riyadh I got the email notification that the device has been delivered at the hotel. You can read more about the Hotel I stayed in on the following link:
| |  | | | urShadow's Blog: Review: Bereket Apart Hotel, Istanbul, Turkey | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
- Upon reaching hotel I received the kit from the reception. Everything was there as stated on their website and I was able to use internet right away.
- The device and external battery were in good condition, I did not face any connectivity or speed issues. Infact the speed was around 10Mb all the time. The external battery was also helpful in charging my mobile or camera. The whole kit was light in weight and easy to carry.
- I used the device for almost 14 hours every day. At a time I connected 3 mobile phones and a laptop with it with ease.
- During my stay I changed the location of my last hotel and informed Alldaywifi team about it and they had no issues picking it from the new location.
- After using the device for almost a week without any issues I noticed that the battery time of the device and the external battery were not up to the mark anymore. I was leaving from Istanbul after a day and thus I wanted an immediate support on that. I emailed Alldaywifi team and they were very quick to respond, they sent a replacement kit, which I received well in time, and this time the device had a bigger battery and the external battery was also bigger. It had great battery time and I did not face any issue, after that, throughout my stay in Turkey. I used this device in almost half of the Turkey and I did not face any issues whatsoever.
- Great service with great customer support, I highly recommend this service!
Suggestion to Alldaywifi:
- If possible, plz open a small counter on airports for device pickup and drop.
- In this way you can grab the attention of more travelers who are not aware of your service thus it can help you in expanding business.
- It will be very convenient for your customers to pick and drop the device at the airport, they will be able to use the internet as soon as they land in Turkey.
- Customers might rent the device for more days as they would include the days of their arrival and departure.
- If opening a counter inside airport is expensive then maybe outside the airport nearby or you can try having a collaboration with any of the counters/shops already available there.
| |  | | | Great service with great customer support, I highly recommend this service! - Review of Alldaywifi, Istanbul, Turkey - TripAdvisor Alldaywifi: Great service with great customer support, I highly recommend this service! - See 255 traveler reviews, 20 candid photos, and great deals for Istanbul, Turkey, at TripAdvisor. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
-urShadow
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