International cell phone plans

[Whale Rider]

One word...........SKYPE!

 

[scar1900]

I have Vonage at home and love it. It is more of a home solution, though (as a way to dorp your local phone provider). There is a way to get a "soft phone" on your laptop, but you have to pay extra I think.

I go to Europe fairly often so I just bought a cheap unlocked cell phone over there (I think it was like $20 on ebay) and bought a prepaid plan in Europe. The prepaid plan comes with a sim card you just pop into your phone and off you go, buy minutes as needed. It's great to have to make local calls and so people can call you while your abroad (the service I have over there gets free incoming calls to boot). I had to buy a phone because I am Verizon over here (ie. CDMA, no sim card) but if you have an unlocked, tri or quad band, Cinguar or T-mobile phone you can use that, no need to buy a second phone.

As far as for calling home, I think Skype is the cheapest, but you need your computer. If you don't have that you can buy calling cards that you can use on your cell phone, but those get expensive.