Let’s be honest—roaming in the Caribbean can feel like a game of roulette. One minute, you’re happily sending beach selfies, and the next, your phone bill looks like you bought a small island. If you’re planning a trip to this paradise, you need to know how to stay connected without going broke.

Let’s break it down.

Why Mobile Roaming in the Caribbean Can Be Expensive

If you’ve ever traveled and forgotten to turn off roaming, you know the pain of getting hit with those surprise charges. Caribbean mobile roaming costs can be steep because you’re usually using a foreign network, and your home provider is charging you a premium for the privilege.

Many Caribbean islands operate on different networks, and depending on your home carrier, you may be roaming on a regional or international partner network. This means you could be paying for calls, texts, and data at much higher rates than back home. Some countries even charge per megabyte of data—yes, per megabyte—which adds up fast if you’re streaming, using maps, or uploading those picture-perfect sunset shots.

How to Avoid a Crazy Phone Bill While Roaming

Okay, now for the good stuff—how do you avoid getting overcharged? Here are some tried-and-true strategies:

1. Get a Local SIM Card

This is one of the easiest ways to cut roaming costs. Most Caribbean islands have affordable prepaid SIM cards that give you local rates on calls, texts, and data. You’ll just need an unlocked phone to use them. Digicel and Flow are the two big mobile providers in the region, and they offer tourist SIMs in many places.

2. Use Wi-Fi Whenever Possible

Wi-Fi is your best friend in the Caribbean. Many hotels, restaurants, and cafes offer free Wi-Fi, so you can browse, call, and text without using your mobile data. Apps like WhatsApp, FaceTime, and Messenger let you stay in touch without paying a dime.

Pro tip: Download offline maps and translation apps before your trip to avoid needing data while exploring.

3. Check Your Carrier’s Roaming Plans

Some carriers offer international roaming packages for a flat daily or weekly rate. These can be lifesavers if you need to stay connected but don’t want to deal with swapping SIM cards.

Popular carriers and their Caribbean roaming options:

• AT&T: International Day Pass (~$10/day)
• Verizon: TravelPass (~$10/day)
• T-Mobile: Magenta Plan includes free texting and 2G data in many Caribbean countries
• Rogers/Bell/Telus (Canada): Roam Like Home (~$12/day)

The trick is to activate these plans before you travel so you don’t accidentally get charged at standard roaming rates.

4. Turn Off Data Roaming (Unless You Need It)

One of the biggest roaming mistakes? Leaving your data on without realizing it. Even background apps like email, social media, and weather updates can quietly eat up data. To be safe, go into your phone settings and turn off data roaming before you board the plane. You can always turn it back on if you really need it.

5. Consider an International eSIM

eSIMs are becoming a game-changer for travelers. If your phone supports eSIM technology (iPhones from XR onward and many newer Android models do), you can download a virtual SIM that gives you affordable data in the Caribbean. Providers like Airhub, BNESIM and Saily offer prepaid eSIMs with data packages that work across multiple islands.

Ookla examined Speedtest^® data from Q4 2019 for five popular Caribbean destinations to see which country has the best mobile roaming speed, how roaming affects latency and how the country of origin affects results.

Roaming speeds excel in the French Antilles

Roaming agreements are complex arrangements negotiated between individual mobile operators on a country-by-country basis.

For travelers, this means that mobile speeds can be very unpredictable abroad. Speedtest data showed Guadeloupe and Martinique had the fastest mean inbound roaming download speeds of all the countries on our list during Q4 2019.

On the other hand, visitors to Cuba and The Bahamas saw the slowest mean download speeds while roaming during Q4 2019.

Local speed does not predict roaming speed

We expect to see slow roaming speeds in countries with slow mobile speeds overall because roaming relies on in-country networks. However, when we look only at the percent difference between roaming and local speeds, we see that local speed was not the only indicator of roaming speed.

For example, Antigua and Barbuda’s mean local download speed was the second fastest on our list during Q4 2019, but that figure represents a 75.5% decrease in mean roaming download speed. The result is that Antigua and Barbuda ranked third to last for mean roaming download speed during Q4 2019. Cuba showed the largest decrease in mean download speed between roaming and local at 82.9%. Martinique showed the smallest decrease at 4.2%.

Roaming’s Effect on latency caribbean mobile roaming

Latency is a major pain point for consumers who are roaming outside of their home country. Roaming signals are routed from the country a consumer is visiting to their country of origin and then back to where they physically are with their phones.

Latency while roaming was highest by far in Cuba during Q4 2019. Roaming latency represented a 372.0% increase over local latency, which was also higher in Cuba than any other country on this list. The high roaming latency in both Guadeloupe and Martinique is likely both because local latency is higher there and because the majority of samples we saw in those locations were roamers from France, so the signals for roamers had to cross an ocean, twice.

Antigua and Barbuda and The Bahamas were tied for the lowest latency we saw for consumers roaming in the Caribbean during Q4 2019. These two countries also had the lowest local latencies during this period.

Performance varies widely by roamer’s origin and destination

Although Puerto Rico is a U.S. territory, visitors from the 50 states of the union had a faster mean download speed roaming in the Dominican Republic than they did in Puerto Rico during Q4 2019. Both were slower than the U.S. average download of 38.74 Mbps during that period.

Roaming download speed for U.S. visitors to The Bahamas were much slower than those seen in the other two locations and 19.4% slower than the mean download speed for residents of The Bahamas. Latency for U.S. roamers was also much higher in Puerto Rico than it was in either The Bahamas or the Dominican Republic. For comparison, mean latency in the U.S. was 47 ms during the same period.

Roaming upload speeds for U.S. visitors were much more similar between the three destinations than we saw on the download side. All were much slower than the mean upload speed in the U.S. of 11.19 Mbps during Q4 2019.

French visitors to Guadeloupe and Martinique experienced similar speeds and latency roaming in both locations, despite the sharp difference in local speeds. Considering the mean download speed in France was 44.19 Mbps and upload was 10.94 Mbps during the same period, these roaming speeds require a bit of an adjustment, but not painfully so. Latency, on the other hand, will require users to pack their patience, as the mean latency in France during this same period was 41 ms.

Guadeloupe, Martinique, the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico are among the best Caribbean destinations if roaming performance is a factor in choosing a cruise. Either way, multi-island travelers should be prepared for a variety of mobile roaming experiences in a variety of countries and aboard ships where roaming uses the ship’s cellular or Wi-Fi network.

Final Thoughts: Stay Connected Without the Stress

Mobile roaming in the Caribbean doesn’t have to be a nightmare. Whether you go with a local SIM, use Wi-Fi smartly, or grab a roaming plan from your carrier, there are plenty of ways to stay connected without breaking the bank. A little planning goes a long way—so before you jet off to turquoise waters and sandy beaches, take a few minutes to sort out your phone situation.

Have you traveled in the Caribbean and found a great way to avoid roaming fees? Drop your tips in the comments below!