Should I purchase a new cell phone in Brasil?

Hello artmunk,

Yes, by all means bring your cellular phone with you it will work just fine here in Brazil; provided of course that it's not a knock-off. The Brazilian government will be blocking all knock-offs very shortly through the device's IMEI number.

Cheers,
James          Expat-blog Experts Team

William, what's a "knock-off" cell?

It's an illegal copy (counterfeit) cellular phone. Here in Brazil called "xing-ling"  (pronounced shing ling) because they predominantly come from China. They'll be blocked by EMEI very shortly.

Oh, OK. Thank you.

Thanks very much, James. I still use an old "slider" phone here in the US (one step up from a flip open; has a slide out keyboard), but am ready to upgrade to a smart phone. Would you have any idea whether it is safe to assume that new models (i.e. Galaxy, iPhone, etc) are cheaper in the US? I'm under the impression this is so but really don't know.

Way cheaper back there Art, there's on top of the inflated price here also a 60% import tax on all products like cellular phones and computers here. Lots of people here actually beg their Brazilian friends coming back from trips to the USA to bring them back smartphones.

Oh, wow! Sounds like I should bring more than one. : )

Make sure your phone is factory unlocked, otherwise it won't work. You can usually take your phone to whatever cell phone provider you have and ask them if it will work with foreign sim cards.

And obviously if it's a verizon phone, it will not work because you'll need a sim card slot

While older US cell phones didn't work in Brazil, newer ones do. I had a friend bring me a Samsung Galaxy S4 last year and it works fine. I have friends here with iPhones which also work. But the phone must be unlocked/unblocked. While that can be done here in Brazil, probably cheaper to have it done in the US. Then, once here in Brazil, you'll just need to buy a SIM card with a local number. As a new arrival, you'll find it easier (if not cheaper) to get a prepaid calling plan. I've used TIM, Oi, Vivo, and now Claro and can't say there's a clear winner or loser. Service in the cities is generally pretty good. Texting is much cheaper than calling, so learn to rely on those "torpedoes"!
John Clites
Johninbrazil.org

One thing it is important to mention is that all my Brazilian friends have multiple SIM phones. they have SIM cards from Claro, Oi, Tim and Vivo according to what their friends and family have . The reason for this is it is much cheaper to phone within the same operator's network than from one telco to another. It is easy to find multiple SIM phones in Brazil but it is not so easy in the UK or France but I would recommend you arrive with a multiple SIM phone if you can.

Ah yes, that is very true. It is very common to have 2 or even more numbers, with different carriers. Businesses in particular do this, but so do individuals.

If you just want to get a cell solely for making calls and the occasional text, you can get a pretty cheap phone. We got a Nokia with two SIM slots that we use as a home phone as we have a plan that allows us to call with it, but not outside our neighborhood.

We paid R$109 for it (about US$43).

Thank you, everyone, for your input and suggestions. This is very helpful!

I have to say that local phone´s prices (and tablets, electronics) are much more reasonable than 3 years ago when I move here. It is used to be 50% cheaper in US and 30% cheaper in Europe. It is not anymore.
$US and Euro currencies are very high now against R$. But also big electronics companies started produced more and more locally (at least assembly, or part of it), thereafter halving importing taxes.

If you're planning to use a mobile phone from one network on a different network than it was originally sold for, be aware that not all networks use the same frequencies. If you try to use a phone that doesn't support all of the required frequencies, you may find that the coverage is not what you expect. Additionally, most phones that are provided for a specific network are locked to that network. Phones can be unlocked pretty easily.