Khartoum - Post Report Question and Answers
Do you have any recommendations regarding mobile phones? Did you keep your home-country plan or use a local provider?
Embassy Khartoum provided officers and family members with cell phones. Most people choose to move the SIM card from this phone into their personal iPhone. We kept our US cell phone numbers by porting them over using Google Voice for a nominal annual fee (about $10 per number). When we returned to the states, we got a new SIM card and reactivated our old numbers, which is great because family and friends do not need to learn a new number every time you return to the States. We did not keep any US provider and thus purchased a new SIM card in the US. - Feb 2018
Apple products are hard to come by here, most phones sold here are Androids. Use the local plan, exceedingly cheap and generally good coverage. - May 2017
Bring your own. Make sure it's unlocked. - Nov 2016
I use my U.S. iPhone with a local provider's chip. I put my home plan on standby when I'm not in the U.S. - Oct 2016
Bring your own smart phone. You can do data here. You'll have error code 1009 because of the sanctions if you have an iPhone though. It's dirt cheap to call out of here, so you can keep in touch with people for very little money. - Mar 2016
Bring your own unlocked smart phone. You can use the Embassy's SIM card and pay for personal calls and data service. It's extremely inexpensive and works reasonably well. - Mar 2015
Embassy provides a basic phone. - Apr 2014
The embassy provides a cell phone, and you pay your bill for personal calls thru the Embassy. - Jun 2011
The GSM network here is very good. You can bring any unlocked quad band phone you want and it will work. There is 3G. iPhones work fine. You just need an unlocked version so you can put a local SIM card in it. - Apr 2010
Take a phone with you and get a local phone number. Very easy. - May 2009
Not particularly. Everyone has one. - Sep 2008
