Telephone company and internet.

Viettel, Vinaphone and Mobifon are the largest.
I think if you don't live very remote there are no big differences in coverage, speed and cost.

The best thing is to buy a data package for Vietnam for your Spanish SIM card and after you arrive in Vietnam go to a big phone company sales point.
If you stay in HCMC, there are large outlets of Vinaphone and Mobifon near the Saigon main post office.

Thanks,
So You say it's the best, contracting a data pack with my tel. CompanY in Spain And In adiction use a cómpany in Vietnam only for calls?

Sorry the sintaxis.

Maybe I Will use VOIP.

yacocati wrote:

Thanks,
So You say it's the best, contracting a data pack with my tel. CompanY in Spain And In adiction use a cómpany in Vietnam only for calls?

No, I mean that you use the Spain SIM card with roaming data packet only for the first days in Vietnam.
After you checked in and recover, you can go to a phone shop and exchange your Spain SIM card by a Vietnamese SIM card.
From then you can call with Spain by Zalo, Whatsapp, etc. via 3G/4G/Wifi internet connection.
The best solution would be a dual SIM card cell phone.
So you can use the Vietnamese SIM card for voice and/or data in Vietnam and the Spain SIM card with roaming data packet for receive TAN of your Spain bank and credit card transactions.

Mark Boyer (Rusty Compass) made a glowing review of the OPPO F5 cell phone. It has dual SIM slots and the memory is expandable to 128 GB. It also has great battery life for $300.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkZG-NtUVqs
Mark lives in Saigon so it obviously works in Vietnam. Does anyone have experience with this?

Thanks for your explanations.

Thanks, your help was useful.

Viettel, run by the military, has the widest coverage across the country -- certainly if you're going off the beaten track. Rates are cheap, though I don't know about data (I only use my phone for voice and sms, so my battery charge lasts a week instead of 10 hours).

Note that many local numbers are going to 10 digits, so check with your provider how to modify your current one, or see http://sggpnews.org.vn/science_technolo … 5203.html.

Keep in mind that any roaming setup is a rip-off, though the EU has been working on it (at least within its borders). Best to get a local sim card/number ASAP.

👍thanks

👍thanks

👍thanks

My GF has set me up with:
Viettel for cable and internet at home (about $US10 a month or a little more)
Mobifon for my cell. She puts about $5US every month and I never run out of data but I don't call outside Vietnam with it. Though I can and have done so when really needed, but it costs more

i used to have dual SIM phone, but have found in Vietnam there is really no point since Vietnam calls data are so cheap, I never use my US or Italian SIMS

Thankyou very much.

yacocati wrote:

What is the best company to have with them contracted the line for cellular and for internet at home, also a good cover to use internet in my Smart phone.?

If you're going to live in a serviced apartment, WiFi is included in the rent so there's no need to bother. 

For the phone, I would just get a Vietnam SIM.  Whether a dual SIM card phone is more convenient is a matter of preference.  Not to us.  We call, text, and receive both from the US every other day on our phones (not always free calls).  I also call and receive calls to all networks within Vietnam almost daily on my phone.  We only have Vietnam phone numbers, and we use Viettel for both of our phones.  Have yet to encounter any difficulties.

My spouse has a 4G prepaid data plan which we put 1M in once a year.  Last month when the year was up, he had 102K left.

I have a 4G postpaid data plan that costs between 105K - 115K every month, but as mentioned above, I make call and text to all networks very frequently, and I don't skim on Internet usage when we're from home or when Wifi is not available.  We don't walk around checking on FB and the likes, but if we need Internet, we turn on cellular and use it.

@Ciambella:
>If you're going to live in a serviced apartment, WiFi is included in the rent so there's no need to bother.

I would say that even if you're renting a house or whatever, you should insist on WiFi and TV subscrition being included in the rent. It's common practice in my experience and that of everyone else I know. Like a fridge, washing machine, microwave etc. However, you might have to ask and insist, and point out they're the usual inclusions anywhere else.

If you receive Wi-Fi as part of the rent package do you have to worry about security? Shouldn't you do all secure transactions on a private connection?

@Jim-Minh:
Private connection is always a good idea, preferably over a VPN. But I think so long as you have a good anti-virus, a firewall defender and frequent checks with Malwarebytes and something like Spybot, it should be OK. Nothing is 100% reliable.

The three different Wi-Fis we had in the three houses we rented were installed from scratch when we moved in. Of course you don't use the one that's already there with the old password; at least change the password to something that's not easy to crack (plenty of advice online about that).

Jim-Minh wrote:

If you receive Wi-Fi as part of the rent package do you have to worry about security? Shouldn't you do all secure transactions on a private connection?

If you have a serviced apartment where Wifi is included, it is very individual. If it has a good WLAN router with modern encryption (at least WPA2), the WLAN password (security key) is secure and the router itself is well password protected, security is fine. However, this is rarely the case, since the WLAN password is usually very simple (e.g. apartment name) and cannot be changed.
In one apartment I had a router that I could access via LAN (password: 12345). At least I could change the settings in the router so that it was more secure than before.

If you have to organize the Wifi yourself, you can set the WLAN password yourself when someone comes and installs the router.

I personally use my mobile phone as a Wifi hotspot for my computer whenever I do financial transactions.

By the way, some antivirus secuity application, issue a WLAN security key warning if the key is too short.

@Jim-Minh:  We use VPN 100% of the time, and for online banking, we also use our own WiFi hotspot.

Andy & Ciambella - That's just insecure enough to make me get Internet service with my phone and tether it to my computer. I'm a day-trader (soon to become night-trader) and need absolute security. I'll use the public Wi-Fi for entertainment and surfing. Thanks for the replies.

Perhaps a separate WiFi hotspot would be good for your work, Jim-Minh, such as this one that we use: Portable Wifi hotspot

We've always taken it with us when travelling to other SEA countries (local SIM).  We had 4 cell phones and 1 laptop on it at the same time every day when we were in Thailand last, and it handled the job beautifully.

Ciambella wrote:

Perhaps a separate WiFi hotspot would be good for your work, Jim-Minh, such as this one that we use: Portable Wifi hotspot

We've always taken it with us when travelling to other SEA countries (local SIM).  We had 4 cell phones and 1 laptop on it at the same time every day when we were in Thailand last, and it handled the job beautifully.

That looks like a very convenient and secure way of doing that job as well as having other functionality. The Viet price is cheaper than what I can get through Amazon in Dallas. I've seen mention of Internet service for such a device in Vietnam at a very good price. That answers a number of questions. Thanks very much.

The one from America doesn't work very well here. My children bought that (more than $100) and had it on their last visit, and they ended up using mine.