T-Mobile coverage

[jefbower]

T-Mobile has free international roaming for data services (e.g. text messaging). However, last year when we were in Guanajuato we didn't have coverage unless we had a wi-fi connection.

We will be visiting Guanajuato again next month and staying in a casa that doesn't have wi-fi. Does anyone know if T-Mobile coverage (via a service partner) in the city has improved over the past year?

Thanks for any insight you can provide.

Jeff

[kasugie]

My T-Mobile works fine all over Guanajuato, except on the ground floor of buildings in callejones. Their roaming partner is Movistar. However, you cannot rely on it as your primary data service provider. After about a gig of usage (basically 500 Mb as T-Mobile double-counts), T-Mobile throttles your connection - so slow that you can only send/receive text messages and text e-mails.

[jefbower]

Thanks for the info, K -- it sounds positive.

Information at the T-Mobile website says that no action needs to be taken for their free international roaming. Was that true in your case? Have things improved over the past year?

Apologies for the questions, but I'm just trying to get a sense of whether we'll automatically have coverage or if there are any steps I need to take to make that happen.

Jeff

[Arthaey]

I also have T-mobile/Movistar coverage pretty much everywhere in the centro (can't speak for elsewhere). You don't have to do anything to set up the included international data, which is quite nice.

That said, it can be pretty slow data (I wait for Web pages to load), so I use wifi whenever it's available.

Also note that T-mobile's plan is meant for traveling, not ex-pats. If you're going to be in Mexico for months, you'll need do to something else.