What's the best option for having a cell phone in another country?

I don’t know if it’s the best option, but convenient enough for me: I just take the SIM out of the tri-band phone I use in the USA and buy a prepaid service wherever I go. Typically in Europe, you buy the service and phone separately. In the USA they come bundled.

I kept a number in Italy for a few years actually, but finally it got to be too much of a hassle to keep paying for it when I stopped visiting Italy.

I would have a local phone in Italy and use a magicjack for communicating with people in the USA—it’s $20/year.

If possible use a computer in an internet cafe – it would depend on where you are traveling.

We can get international service on our AT&T iPhones for a monthly fee but the calling charges to the States are expensive.

@janbb Yeah I figured, of course I would be calling back to the states, but I also don’t know how often I’ll be calling local italian places and people.

If you’ll be there fo two years, yo might want to rent a cellphone there or get phone cards for service.

@perspicacious: this was back before that stuff was especially effective. Yes, that’s a better idea these days. Well, at least if you weren’t traveling in Italy and elsewhere on the continent, and in need of a phone (as I was).