I have a tip on general points in phone use, especially abroad, but before you read it you might want to consider my current personal approach, Google’s Fi service.

Google Fi is a “mobile virtual network operator” or MVNO that combines the cellular services of carriers in over 130 countries (T-Mobile, Sprint, and US Cellular here in the US) with public WiFi services to offer you broad connectivity.  The rates are reasonable--$20 for voice/SMS per month, plus $10 per gig of data.  Any unused data is credited back to next month’s bill, so if you pick a plan for $30 (base plus 1 G of data) and use no data at all, you’ll have the ten bucks credited back so each month your bill will be only the $20 base.  This means that if you simply turn off cellular data and use WiFi, your bill will be just the $20 base charge.

The downside of Fi is that it only works on three phones currently—the Nexus 5, Nexus 6p (mine), and the new Pixel models.  That means that if you already have a smartphone and don’t want to change it, you’re out of luck.  If you can change phones, then Fi is great.

And I mean great.  With the 6p and the latest version of Android I can use the phone everywhere I normally use it around my home and have no issues.  Same with normal restaurants and public places, and with cellular data off I don’t use the data plan at all.  Internationally you have to check to see just what happens in the countries where you’re traveling.  Usually there’s a charge to connect to a phone in another country, but not always.  In some cases, the Google page on countries supported is out of date, though.  I went to Cuba recently and it wasn’t supposed to support cellular access with Fi at all.  I had good cell connections, including high-speed data, everywhere we went.

Take a serious look at this plan, and if you also use Google Chrome you can take your Fi calls and SMS on your desktop without using the phone at all.  It’s a handy feature in what so far has been a great travel phone solution.