Visiting USA

[danco]

I will be visiting the USA for a month shortly (mostly around Oakland, CA) and am wondering which phone to use. I have a Motorola Moto E4 and a Moto G4. The E4 is a US model and the G4 is a UK model. As far as I understand it, the E4 does receive 4G but the G4, because it is British, doesn't work on the US 4G bands.

I am primarily interested in speech and text (only to US numbers), possibly some web browsing but not streaming music or video.

Probably using the T-Mobile network (or Metro, which runs over T-Mobile). 3G would satisfy me, but I am wondering if there are likely to be any issues with it.

The G4 is obviously the better phone if it works well enough, and I have used it a fair bit more. Neither is my main phone nowadays; that is an iPhone 7, but if I take it I will have it entirely on airplane mode for use of wifi, rather than swapping out the SIM during my visit.

[Cleoriff Level 85: Esteemed · Accepted solution]

@danco 

If you are travelling to the US and you have a US phone, then that's the one I would be using. If it's unlocked you could use a local sim from AT&T or T Mobile

We have found from others posting, that UK (O2) phones don't work particularly well in the US. Speeds are slow and it's quite expensive.

One of our members @Bambino  lives in the US so I will mention him and hope he can give further advice when he is back online.

Either way, use WiFi wherever possible to keep costs down.

[Bambino]

@danco  You're probably better off using the US model phone. You can check compatibility here: https://willmyphonework.net/

[Marjo]

Good luck with your travels @danco ! Let us know if there's anything else the community could help you with or if you're all good to go!

[danco]

Yes, I was already inclined to feel my E4 (US model) would be the better choice. It only runs Android 5, while the UK G4 runs Android7, but for my use I don't think that matters much.

[BOSSGOGG]

For text and calls the E4 with a T mob sim would be the best bet.

Another consideration is using Skype on the WiFi only iphone. Sign up for the free month unlimited calls and use that when poss. It's what I use in the states for USA numbers especially.
( although both my EE Max and O2 sims allow USA roaming)