Taking a prepaid cell phone on vacation in the USA

When going on vacation in the USA, don't bother renting a cellphone. The inconvenience outweighs any small savings. Rather than renting a phone at the airport, if you can get to your hotel and are near a shopping center of some kind, just hop down to that store and buy a prepaid cellphone for as little as $10USD, and a 60 minute airtime card for another $20 USD. Or even better, get a phone that comes with minutes such as Net10.

And if you've been using a prepaid cell phone already, you can use the money you've saved toward that Disney vacation.

Coverage

Pick a cellphone with good coverage in the area you will be on vacation. TracFone tends to have good coverage since they lease their network from other phone companies, so even in an area with not much coverage, they lease their network from whichever company does have coverage in the area. Their costs are a little higher, but you're probably not going to spend a lot of time on the phone during your holiday.

Should you get a camera phone?

Well, you're probably going to take a camera along. So you really don’t need a camera phone, unless you absolutely need to send photos and you haven't brought your computer. However, you certainly could use one as a

backup if you forget the other one.

Battery Life, etc.

However, my main consideration when choosing a cellphone for my holiday is the battery life. You don't want be hassled about finding a way to recharge the phone couple of days. I have a simple phone with a long battery life which has a quick turn on/turn off time.

[Update: I now have a simple camera phone, which still has pretty good battery life as the screen shuts down fairly quickly.]

If you're already in the USA

Then if you already have a cell phone, then that's probably the phone you will take on vacation. However, if, let's say, you REALLY want to get away from the office, then you can leave your regular cell phone at home and get a cheap prepaid cell phone for any emergencies.

Time to go home

At the end of your vacation, you can give the cellphone to a friend, take it with you, or recycle it. It's only $20 after all. No need to go to another counter at the airport or mall.

Protect your personal information

If you do "recycle" it, remember to remove the SIM card to make sure no personal data is on the phone. You should also clear out any part of the address book that's not stored on the SIM card.

You can check out some . . .

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