Local Thai SIM or travel eSIM — the actual numbers

Two options, and the gap is smaller than you expect

Thailand gives you a genuine choice. The local carriers sell cheap tourist SIMs in every arrivals hall, and the travel eSIM market treats Thailand as one of its most competitive countries. Both sides start in roughly the same place — $3 to $10 — so the decision comes down to how long you are staying, how far off the tourist grid you are going, and whether you want to hand over a passport.

eSIM prices we checked ourselves

These came from the providers' own sites — Saily's and Airalo's on 13 August 2026, Nomad's on 17 August 2026.

Provider	Data	Days	Price	Per GB
Saily	1GB	7	$2.99	$2.99
Airalo	1GB	3	$4	$4
Nomad	1GB	7	$5	$5
Saily	3GB	30	$5.99	$2
Nomad	3GB	30	$6	$2
Airalo	5GB	7	$7	$1.40
Nomad	10GB	30	$10	$1
Saily	10GB	30	$10.99	$1.10
Nomad	50GB	10	$12	$0.24
Airalo	20GB	30	$18	$0.90
Airalo	Unlimited	7	$21.50	—
Airalo	50GB	30	$27.50	$0.55

The spread is the story. Buy in 1GB slices and you pay up to $5 a gigabyte; buy Nomad's 50GB and you pay 24 cents — the lowest verified rate on this site, though it runs for ten days rather than thirty. Airalo sells its Thailand packages under the product name Maew, which is what you will see in the app — it is Airalo's own branding, not a Thai network.

An earlier version of this page said Nomad's Thailand prices were unverified and that its 50GB figure should be treated as a lead rather than a quote. They are verified now, and the earlier doubt turned out to rest on our own bad record: we had the 50GB plan down as running 30 days when it runs 10, and its 10GB at $9 when it is $10. eSIMCard's rows have been withdrawn: we read its own pages on 18 August 2026, found the figures we held were wrong, and could not store the real ones. See our eSIMCard page. The $8.50 we hold for an eSIM Go 3GB is not unverified but unbuyable: eSIM Go sells wholesale to resellers and publishes no consumer price — checked on esim-go.com on 18 August 2026, where there is no basket, no checkout and no per-country page — so its rows cannot be bought or ever verified. See our eSIM Go page.

What the local SIM costs, and what we don't know

Three carriers matter, and really only two: AIS, and True Corporation, which absorbed DTAC and TrueMove H. National Telecom is a minor player you can ignore as a visitor.

Tourist SIM counters sit in the arrivals halls at Suvarnabhumi (BKK), Don Mueang (DMK), Phuket (HKT) and Chiang Mai (CNX), with both AIS and True represented and tourist-specific kiosks alongside them. Expect around $10 for a starter pack.

What we cannot tell you is how much data that $10 buys. Allowances rotate with promotions and we have not verified a current figure, so treat $10 as the entry price and read the board at the counter rather than trusting a number from a blog.

A passport is required for registration. That is Thai regulation, not shop policy, so there is no way around it and no point arriving without one.

Coverage decides more than price does

AIS has the largest geographic footprint in Thailand and is the best choice for islands, remote beaches, trekking routes and the northern highlands. True is strong across Bangkok and the major cities but weaker once you leave them. National average speed is about 40 Mbps.

Some gaps apply whichever network you are on: the remote jungle interiors of the northern highlands and the Chiang Rai border areas, the outer reaches of smaller Andaman islands such as Koh Lanta and the far beaches of Koh Chang, ferry crossings between islands, and the deep interior of Koh Tao and some smaller gulf islands.

This matters for eSIMs because an eSIM can only ever be as good as the network underneath it. None of these providers publish which Thai network their plans actually roam onto, and we hold no confirmed host carrier for any of them — if remote coverage is the whole point of your trip, that uncertainty is an argument for buying the local SIM from AIS directly.

Who should buy what

A week or less, cities and the usual islands. Take the eSIM. Saily's 1GB for seven days at $2.99 covers maps and messaging; Airalo's 5GB for seven days at $7 covers a normal trip with photos and video calls. It installs before you fly, and there is no queue and no passport.

Two weeks or more with real data use. The per-gigabyte curve rewards volume, but watch the window as well as the allowance. Nomad's 50GB at $12 is the cheapest rate we have confirmed anywhere, and it lasts ten days; over a fortnight or a month, Airalo's verified 50GB for 30 days at $27.50 is the plan that actually fits. Thai top-ups on a local SIM are usually cheaper still, but we do not publish local top-up prices we have not checked.

Trekking in the north, or outer islands. Local AIS SIM, passport in hand. Nothing resold can beat the host network at its own coverage.

Tethering a laptop. Check the hotspot policy before you pay. It is the most common thing travellers get wrong, and unlimited plans are the usual offenders.

Full carrier detail and pricing sits on the Thailand hub. If you are not certain your handset supports eSIM, check eSIM-compatible phones first.