Buying a SIM Card or eSIM in Greece

With thousands of years of history, exceptional weather, and great food, Greece offers visitors an experience that’s hard to beat. I’ve visited several times over the years, and every time I end up wishing I’d stayed longer.

In this land of grilled meat and feta cheese, staying connected is almost as easy as putting on weight. SIM cards are easy to purchase, and costs can be reasonably low if you buy the right package.

If you only need data, though, travel eSIMs are often cheaper and certainly a lot less hassle to buy and use. However you decide to do it, here’s what you need to know.

There are three cell networks in Greece, operated by Cosmote, Vodafone, and Nova. Various resellers also offer service on one of those three networks.

Cosmote costs the most, but has the best coverage and fastest data speeds. Vodafone has the best prices, but speeds can be limited, especially in popular areas. Nova is somewhere in the middle on speed, coverage, and price.

I’ve used Vodafone in Athens and elsewhere in the past, but was sticking to the western side of Greece on this trip. Starting with a few days on Corfu, my route then took me to and between smaller islands further south in the Ionian Sea on a week-long sailing trip.

After checking the coverage map and availability of stores to purchase both SIM and credit, I went with Vodafone.

While my Vodafone SIM worked well on my last trip, I’ve since been recommending friends use travel eSIMs when they visit. Prices are good, even for larger data packs but especially for the smaller ones, and it means they don’t need to start their holiday by walking around phone shops.

Of the companies I’ve used and recommended to others, Ubigi generally offers the best prices in Greece. That’s not necessarily true for every size of data pack, though: there’s a table below with the latest prices for easier comparison.

Like most travel eSIMs, it’s data-only: you don’t get a local number. I use apps for everything from communication to transport these days, so the lack of a local number very rarely matters to me, but you might have different needs.

One thing worth noting: if you’re planning to travel to several European countries within a few weeks, it might be worth looking at some of the regional eSIM packages on offer.

There are too many to list each one separately (and they change all the time), but as a starting point, these are the Europe eSIM options from companies I’d actually consider using:

• aloSIM (34 countries)
• Airalo (39 countries)
• Nomad (30-35 countries)
• SIMOptions (29-39 countries)
• yeSIM (31 countries)
• easySIM (36 countries)

If you’re new to eSIMs, they offer big benefits to travelers in terms of how quickly, easily, and (often) cheaply you can get connected when you arrive in a new country. Most recent phones support them, and you can read all about them here.

We’ve also got a quick and easy eSIM finder that lets you find the best provider in every country in a few seconds!

Buying a Vodafone SIM and getting service was very straightforward, at least on Corfu. You’ll likely have a similar experience anywhere in Greece that sees enough tourism for English to be widely spoken.

There are a couple of Vodafone stores close to each other in the downtown part of Corfu Town, and I visited the one beside San Rocco square. It’s a small store, but given its location, it sees plenty of tourists.

The staff member asked what I wanted, and offered a few options for my two weeks in the country. Note you’ll need your passport to buy a SIM from a Vodafone store, and the staff will take a photocopy of it.

As soon as I’d finished swapping SIM cards, I received a few text messages from Vodafone, and data started working immediately afterward. The entire process took less than five minutes.

Vodafone has a number of different plans and packages available, but for most people visiting Greece, the best option (and certainly the simplest one to understand) is, unusually, the tourist package.

There are two choices: one for €20 that has 25GB of data, 200 domestic calling minutes, and lasts for an oddball 20 days. The other costs €30, with unlimited data and 200 minutes, for 30 days.

I’ve bought several other non-tourist packages from Vodafone in the past, and while I sometimes saved a small amount of money by building my own bundle, it was often surprisingly hard to do.

With “mandatory” top-ups and a fee for the SIM card itself, by the time I actually got a useful amount of data (and sometimes, calls and texts), I’d often spend a lot of time discussing and working out options to save a euro or two at best.

If you decide to do the same, look for the “CU” SIM cards and packages, or just ask the staff member what the current promotions are. Note, too, that a 12% tax is charged on top-ups, which means that your (eg) €10 top-up will only add €8.93 to your balance.

We’ve started to get a few anecdotal reports (see the comments below) of Vodafone stores in heavily-touristed areas refusing to sell anything except the most expensive prepaid packages to visitors.

If that happens to you and the staff member won’t budge, just walk out and choose a different provider, or go for a travel eSIM as discussed below and avoid the problem entirely.

Ubigi

Of the travel eSIM companies that I’ve used and suggested to others, Ubigi generally has the best pricing in Greece. It’s also worth taking a look at Nomad: I’ve sometimes seen specials on specific data packs that are even cheaper.

They’re not the only options, of course, and I’ve compared many of the others in the past. Here’s how the best ones stack up in Greece: I update the details each week, most recently on 14 April 2025.

Topping Up

Vodafone

You can buy top-ups at any Vodafone store (store locator here), as well as thousands of kiosks, service stations, and supermarkets across the country.

Nomad

Topping up with Nomad (or any of the other travel eSIM companies) is done by logging into the website or app. You just select your Greece eSIM, hit the top-up button, and buy the same package again.

The top-up packs have exactly the same pricing and duration as the original eSIMs: there’s little difference between topping up your current eSIM and buying a new one, other than not having to activate it.

While there are a few parts of Greece where you’ll get 5G service with Vodafone, for now they’re mostly in the major cities. It’s being rolled out rapidly, so you may happen to find it elsewhere on both the mainland and islands, but don’t count on it.

For now, expect LTE service in most places. There’s no 3G any more: it was shut off in late 2023.

Coverage and speed were surprisingly variable on Greece’s western coast. Despite having the largest population, Corfu Town had the worst reception and speed. I had minimal service in much of the old town, probably due to the stone buildings surrounding me, but things improved elsewhere.

Further down the coast, things improved dramatically. On the mainland, and while sailing between Lefkada, Ithaca, Meganisi, and other islands, I had reliable service and generally good speeds whenever I checked. I never lost signal anywhere.

As you’d expect, service was very reliable in Athens, whether I was in a tourist area or anywhere else in the city.

Greece is part of the European Union, so EU roaming regulations apply. These “roam like at home” rules ended roaming charges across much of Europe in 2017, letting you use a SIM card from any EU country across all the others at no extra charge.

There are some exceptions and limits, however, especially with large data packages. Double-check the exact details at time of purchase, or just use one of the regional European eSIMs I mentioned earlier.

With the Vodafone tourist SIMs I discussed up top, some but not all of your data allowance is usable elsewhere in the EU; roughly 15GB with the cheaper package and 22GB with the more expensive one.

---

Check out our guides to SIM cards and eSIMs in 65+ other countries here.