The best SIM cards for travelling to Bali

Australians heading to Bali is almost a cliché by now, but it’s a cliché for a reason; holidaying in Bali is highly affordable, beautiful and the food is fantastic.

What’s less fantastic is arriving, taking a photo of the local views and then realising that you’ve got no way to share it with the jealous folks back home stuck in their humdrum 9-to-5 lives.

This guide will take you through some simple options for travel SIM cards and mobile phone and data access in Bali, so you can make an informed choice that’s best for your needs and budget.

The very first factor to take into consideration is that Bali isn’t a country in its own right. It is part of Indonesia, so when you’re researching, you need to look for plans that include Indonesian coverage if you want phone access while in Bali.

Then it’s a matter of working out whether you want convenience, best budget pricing or to use your existing Australian SIM while you’re lying on a Balinese beach living the good life.

Travel SIMs sell themselves on convenience, and not typically value to speak of; you’re paying a premium to have a SIM card shipped to you before you travel – or emailed to you in the case of an eSIM – so that you don’t have to fuss with anything at all when you land.

The issue here is that very few Travel SIMs are all that price competitive, so it’s important to work out just how much that convenience is worth to you, because most of them don’t offer particularly good value for money.

That’s why we favour Australia Post’s very simple International Roaming Plan, which costs just $5 for 30 days of coverage. Not much coverage, it’s true, with 50 minutes of calls, 50 texts and just 50MB of data on tap. But combined with hotel Wi-Fi to meet your data needs, that’s enough to stay in immediate communication with the folks back home without breaking the bank.

Airolo only sells eSIMs, so the first step to working out if it’s the right choice for you is to check that your phone has eSIM support.

There’s a good balance in an eSIM between pricing and convenience, because most providers can offer you eSIMs directly over the Internet, either through dedicated apps or sometimes via emailed codes. No waiting for the postman, no fiddling with SIM card trays or easily lost plastic fragments, either.

In Indonesia, Airolo sells a variety of prepaid eSIM packages, ranging from $US5.50 for 1GB of data with a 7 day expiry period up to 20GB over 30 days for $US40. If you’re travelling more widely in South East Asia, Airolo’s Asialink deals may also be worth considering. Airolo uses the Telkomsel network within Bali (and Indonesia more widely) with 4G LTE coverage.

Vodafone’s $5 roaming deal certainly ticks the convenience-while-holidaying-in-Bali box rather nicely, given that it takes your existing plan, flies it over the sea to a Balinese beach and leaves it there waiting for you to unlock it for – you guessed it – $5 per day above your existing plan terms.

The one caveat here is that if your plan includes no extra data charges, just a speed drop once your quota is used, that doesn’t carry overseas at all. Instead you’ll pay $5 over the top again for each additional GB of data you need.

Here's a selection of Vodafone plans that support $5/day international roaming

As with competitors Optus and its not-quite-identical $5/day deal or Telstra’s Day Pass solution, the other catch is that a longer stay will lead to those $5 charges adding up. Vodafone doesn’t charge you if you don’t use your phone on a given day, which is nice, but still, a fortnight’s lazing on the beach could add an additional $70 to your mobile bill, and that’s money better spent on experiences and drinks, isn’t it?

Vodafone aren’t your only option for roaming-friendly telcos within Australia, however. Here’s a range of alternative telco options that support roaming in Bali:

Look, we’ve all been in that situation where we land somewhere only to realise we’ve forgotten something important, whether it’s a fresh razor, a battery pack or indeed a reliable SIM option for our holidays. If that’s you, then Telkomsel’s Tourist Prepaid Card could be just what you’re looking for.

RP150,000 (roughly $16 AUD) will buy you a 30-day plan with 25 minutes of voice calls and 25GB of data to use on Telkomsel’s 5G network throughout Indonesia – including Bali.

What’s particularly useful here is that the Telkomsel Tourist Prepaid card can be pre-ordered before you leave Australia with a direct pickup location within Bali’s Denpasar Airport.