Wifi Plans

[YungCruzVet]

I've never bought Wifi before on a cruise so excuse my ignorance. Looking for the "cheapest" plan that will allow us to FaceTime our son back home, or receive texts in an emergency. We won't be using out phones for anything other than that. Drop you knowledge, please & thanks!

[imkatz]

We were just on Vista and had the social plan.  It does not allow facetime, or video messaging on Messenger or Whatsap.    I don't know about the other 2 plans, but you may need the premium one.

 

[nwcruiselover]

You need the premium plan for FaceTime.

[atxlady]

What if we just want to listen to our Amazon Music? Which Plan would work the best?

 

[Moneyscruise]

You can only stream and use facetime on the premium plan.

 

[Virga]

1 hour ago, Moneyscruise said:

You can only stream and use facetime on the premium plan.

 

 

According to the disclaimer when I went to purchase the premium plan, it doesn't include music streaming.  I don't know if that's accomplished by a server block, or they're just warning you that speeds can vary enough to make it unreliable.  

[zorky12]

On the premium package you can also call home with wifi calling. 

[sharon&family]

1 hour ago, zorky12 said:

On the premium package you can also call home with wifi calling. 

How do you do that?

[Virga]

Wifi calling did not work last month with my carrier (Verizon) on my last cruise (Sunrise) with the premium package.  I had tested it before the cruise using airplane mode and wifi at a hotel and a gas station, but no luck onboard.  Tests also came through while using the hotel and gas station wifi, but did not come through on the ship. I set up a TextNow number so my work can contact me realtime on this next one.  I'm certain it worked in the past with T-Mobile on NCL and Celebrity.  

[groundloop]

8 hours ago, Virga said:

Wifi calling did not work last month with my carrier (Verizon) on my last cruise (Sunrise) with the premium package.  I had tested it before the cruise......

 

It's possible that you were in a dead zone on the ship.  I've seen that in some areas the 'premium' plan is sort of decent, but in other parts of the ship it was pretty bad (which unfortunately was always the case in my cabin).

[Jamesatgsu]

10 hours ago, sharon&family said:

How do you do that?

Go into your phone settings and set it to do wifi calling.

[TravelGirlinDallas]

21 hours ago, YungCruzVet said:

I've never bought Wifi before on a cruise so excuse my ignorance. Looking for the "cheapest" plan that will allow us to FaceTime our son back home, or receive texts in an emergency. We won't be using out phones for anything other than that. Drop you knowledge, please & thanks!

You'll be expected to use your phones to view menus in the MDR, since they are trying to avoid handing out paper copies due to Covid. Also, since they aren't delivering the printed Fun Times to your cabin anymore, the Hub app has become pretty essential to knowing what's going on.

[Virga]

1 hour ago, groundloop said:

 

It's possible that you were in a dead zone on the ship.  I've seen that in some areas the 'premium' plan is sort of decent, but in other parts of the ship it was pretty bad (which unfortunately was always the case in my cabin).

 

Maybe? But I had surprisingly good internet access everywhere I went, including on my balcony where I tried to use the WiFi calling feature.  And you'd think that at least texts would have come in as I wandered the ship!  It really 'felt' like it was either intentionally blocked, or unavailable due to some network incompatibility.  Regardless, I'd 100% recommend someone set up a web based messenging app, or something like TextNow if SMS is vital. 

 

Edit: and yes, we felt this was the first time on a cruise where carrying our phones was necessary.  You could still pick up the fun times and request paper menus if you were absolutely determined to leave your phone in the cabin, but the new status quo absolutely relies on people having the app on a smart phone.

Edited September 29, 2021 by Virga

[Jamesatgsu]

21 hours ago, YungCruzVet said:

I've never bought Wifi before on a cruise so excuse my ignorance. Looking for the "cheapest" plan that will allow us to FaceTime our son back home, or receive texts in an emergency. We won't be using out phones for anything other than that. Drop you knowledge, please & thanks!

The social media plan works with facebook messenger. Video chat within it wasn't blocked as I recall, but wasn't usable because of the speed. 

 

Because of work, I've had premium service since then.

13 hours ago, Virga said:

 

According to the disclaimer when I went to purchase the premium plan, it doesn't include music streaming.  I don't know if that's accomplished by a server block, or they're just warning you that speeds can vary enough to make it unreliable.  

 

Would have to be a server block as speeds can support video streaming. Probably due to people listening to music with a bluetooth speaker around the ship or loudly within their cabins is why they might block it.

[Colorado Beach Bum]

10 hours ago, Virga said:

Wifi calling did not work last month with my carrier (Verizon) on my last cruise (Sunrise) with the premium package.  I had tested it before the cruise using airplane mode and wifi at a hotel and a gas station, but no luck onboard.  Tests also came through while using the hotel and gas station wifi, but did not come through on the ship. I set up a TextNow number so my work can contact me realtime on this next one.  I'm certain it worked in the past with T-Mobile on NCL and Celebrity.  

WiFi calling (AT&T) did not work for us on Panorama using the premium plan.  I thought I had used it in the past but not this time.  Was disappointed with premium because of that.  Had the mid package two weeks before on Mardi Gras and had no problems accessing all the websites I wanted but no WiFi calling.  I upgraded two weeks later and WiFi calling didn’t work. 

[Virga]

2 minutes ago, Colorado Beach Bum said:

WiFi calling (AT&T) did not work for us on Panorama using the premium plan.  I thought I had used it in the past but not this time.  Was disappointed with premium because of that.  Had the mid package two weeks before on Mardi Gras and had no problems accessing all the websites I wanted but no WiFi calling.  I upgraded two weeks later and WiFi calling didn’t work. 

 

I'm sort of glad to hear it was not just me - I hadn't been on Carnival in a long time, I didn't do wifi calling way back then.  I knew for sure it worked with T-Mobile on other cruiselines more recently, though, so I wondered if somehow I'd done something wrong.  It's not a huge dealbreaker, but it is frustrating.  Texts especially take so little data, why not let us get them if we're paying for internet?

[Jamesatgsu]

27 minutes ago, TravelGirlinDallas said:

You'll be expected to use your phones to view menus in the MDR, since they are trying to avoid handing out paper copies due to Covid. Also, since they aren't delivering the printed Fun Times to your cabin anymore, the Hub app has become pretty essential to knowing what's going on.

Just to be clear, you don't need an internet plan for the HUB app to work. I know some people get concerned about that.

2 minutes ago, Colorado Beach Bum said:

WiFi calling (AT&T) did not work for us on Panorama using the premium plan.  I thought I had used it in the past but not this time.  Was disappointed with premium because of that.  Had the mid package two weeks before on Mardi Gras and had no problems accessing all the websites I wanted but no WiFi calling.  I upgraded two weeks later and WiFi calling didn’t work. 

I've never tried it on Carnival, but my wifi-calling using Google Voice worked fine on the Norwegian Jade. I didn't try using my Cricket number while onboard.

[Virga]

4 minutes ago, Jamesatgsu said:

The social media plan works with facebook messenger. Video chat within it wasn't blocked as I recall, but wasn't usable because of the speed. 

 

Because of work, I've had premium service since then.

Would have to be a server block as speeds can support video streaming. Probably due to people listening to music with a bluetooth speaker around the ship or loudly within their cabins is why they might block it.

 

That makes sense, when it worked on the Sunrise (I don't remember that disclaimer when I went to purchase onboard, but I was already a few drinks in) I felt like we had to play close attention to when our neighbors came out on their balconies.  We kept it pretty quiet, and turned it off when others came outside, but not everyone is quite so self conscious of being irritating.  Our neighbors just aft of us were part of a large party group, and they easily could have been terrible neighbors if their good time involved loud music at all hours.  

[Colorado Beach Bum]

29 minutes ago, Virga said:

 

I'm sort of glad to hear it was not just me - I hadn't been on Carnival in a long time, I didn't do wifi calling way back then.  I knew for sure it worked with T-Mobile on other cruiselines more recently, though, so I wondered if somehow I'd done something wrong.  It's not a huge dealbreaker, but it is frustrating.  Texts especially take so little data, why not let us get them if we're paying for internet?

Text messaging went through no problem with both mid and premium. 

[Virga]

22 minutes ago, Colorado Beach Bum said:

Text messaging went through no problem with both mid and premium. 

Really??  Go figure.  I had to use an internet-based app when I realized that my wifi calling and wifi texts didn't work onboard.  Are you an Apple user, by any chance?  I understand iMessage works over any internet, it's not actually SMS.  I have Android (Pixel5 on Verizon) and I can only use texts in airplane mode if wifi calling is working.  TextNow is a workable alternative, but it requires my coworkers to remember to use a different number.  

 

I'll probably let my phone connect in Mexico halfway through the cruise to make sure I don't miss anything truly important.

[Encore37]

Which WIFI plan do you need to watch YouTube videos?

[zorky12]

If you follow Cruise with Josh on youtube, Peter was using Wifi for calling on Mardi Gras to call home when they were quarantined. My wife used it when we were on Vista every day but its been a while, We have Verizon and I use it all the time because where we live we have poor cell service. Here is a screen shot of a call on it right now

 

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