Prepaid SIM data roaming M1 vs Starhub vs Singtel

Prepaid SIM data roaming M1 vs Starhub vs Singtel

23 Oct 2016

Social apps like WhatsApp is now the de facto standard for messaging and for voice calls over IP. With more Singaporeans travelling abroad for short holidays, data roaming is now a basic requirement for travellers. Instead of activating and losing your postpaid SIM, it might be a good idea to buy a Prepaid SIM card in Singapore before heading overseas.

There are two operators that offer very interesting products for data centric users. Previously these plans are meant for local use. Now, they are enabled for roaming. So, instead of paying expensive charges roaming, you pay the local rates.

Both Starhub and M1 has very similar plans for the short term travellers. The 3 days and 7 days 1GB data should be something that most people will use.

M1 on the other hand has a 30 days plan for both 300MB and 1GB and it costs S$5.00 and S$10.00 respectively.

As for Starhub, they have the bigger capacity plans at 1.2GB, 2.4GB and 3.6GB at S$10, S$15 and S$20 respectively. M1 has a 3GB data plan for S$30 lasting 50 days.

One thing to note is that both Starhub and M1 works with different telcos in various countries and territories.

For M1, the prepaid data roaming will work in these countries/territories :

Hong Kong, Indonesia, Macau, Malaysia, Taiwan

Starhub has more prepaid roaming partners in these countries/territories :

Australia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, United Kingdom and USA

Roaming aside, if you seldom make calls and don’t want to be tied down with a post paid line, the 3GB for 50 days may be a good option since prepaid voice calls all comes with free caller-id which postpaid lines require a subscription of S$5 per mth.

Singtel plans cover 7 days and may not be as attractive but they do cover China, India, Philippines etc. They are tabulated below :

Singtel Roaming Charges