Wi-Fi Plan Help? P.S. GO HEELS

[Laplayaperson]

SO, its been years since we have cruised.  But with teens and occasionally check emails I'm curious what would be the best plan for us? or should we just temporarily add International calling to our phone plan?  All comments/suggestions welcome, fire away!!!  (GO UNC)

Edited April 3, 2022 by Laplayaperson

[ray98]

Adding international calling to your cell plan does nothing to help the data situation. 

 

The middle plan is good for basic browsing but you need the premium plan if you want any chance at success for streaming video or anything like that.  Also, remember the plan only allows one device at a time.  You either need to get a plan for each passenger or log in and out of devices to share the one plan.

[pinto18]

Value plan fine for checking emails, face-book etc. Just tell the kids they may. not be able to stream movies or anything . Our ATT phone plan includes Mexico so we don't need an international plan when in port ( we usually do Mexican Riviera cruises) . And yes, you can share a plan but only one device at a time

[HarborHermit]

I used the Value plan on my first few cruises for checking emails. It was adequate most of the time, but would be slow during high usage times.

The last two cruises I used the Premium plan because I wanted to use Zoom. It worked, but worked better on my phone than on my laptop. Get used to sharing, because the internet plan can only be used by one person on the folio at a time.

[Joehult]

The internet on carnival is an illusion on its best days. You will just about give up on it and storm down to the cs desk for a refund, then it suddenly works for 5 minutes, before disappearing again. They’ve completely blocked WiFi calling, you can maybe get one or two very short YouTube videos to load, streaming is not happening ever, and unless you spam f5, even simple browsing has very high latency and will timeout fail 9/10. And it’s best to have AT&T postpaid as your provider, since a talk and text package is only $100 for unlimited, it also comes with a barely useable 500mb of lte data. T-Mobile wants $6 per minute for cell at sea service, Verizon wants $3. 

[PSU2LSU]

If you purchase the internet plan on your phone you can hotspot your phone.  Both my wife and I and kids were able to be on the same plan at the same time.  
 

[kokoko]

I had the premium plan on my Jan. Mardi Gras cruise. We did messenger calling and video it worked all the time.  I was very pleased with this premium plan kept in touch with all my family. Also kept up with my emails.

[klfrodo]

Currently on the Freedom.

I purchased the Premium plan.

To say Internet connectivity sucked would be an understatement.

occasionaly, I hit 1.5Mbps download speed. 90% of the rest of the time I measured download speed of 30 Kilo bytes per second IF it was working at all

[Moonarino]

Some international phone plans do include a Data option with a set amount of data, for not a bad price. I might advise adding that to a middle WiFi plan. That way you could have two users at a time and a little more versatility.

 

Internet speed of course is GREATLY dependent on peak vs off-peak usage. That will never change I'm sure.

 

And my PS: I'm beyond happy for "rookie" Coach Davis (no rookie at all) and the whole team, ecstatic is probably the word. A month ago I was just hoping the Heels would make it to the 64, but then it just got better and better AND BETTER!  They're a tough, gritty bunch.

 

 

Edited April 3, 2022 by Moonarino

[Bostwick girl]

I bought the value plan  on Spirit so I could use my iPad. I will never make that mistake again! I was only able to use it very early in the morning. Probably didn’t get 15 minutes use in the 5 days I had it!

 

[cruisingguy007]

Depending on where you sail, you can buy a prepaid sim at the first port stop, many times you can order a blank one (no balance but carrier branded you intent to load) before you leave. They work just like pre-paid ones do here, usually unlimited calls texts and various data buckets.  

[CruisingFromLA]

Just to give you an idea, for my past 2 sailings on Carnival (Sunrise and Panorama) I was averaging 0.10 to 0.15 Mbps download speeds on the Premium Plan. It was painfully slow to even do basic things such as load a website. In fact, the internet went completely out at times. It is not worth it.