Best eSIM Lisbon. The best eSIM for traveling to Portugal

Avoid roaming fees when traveling to Portugal with the best eSIM for Lisbon. We bring you two eSIMs for two different types of travel plans. With MEO Enjoy Portugal you’ll get an incredible eSIM card for Portugal with 30GB of data for an incredibly low price of €15, and if your plan includes Spain or any other countries in Europe, Orange eSIM Holidays comes also with 30GB of data (60GB at max speed in Spain) for €25, 100 minutes of voice calls and coverage in the 27 countries of the European Union, Norway and Liechtenstein.

The Castle of São Jorge overlooks this cosmopolitan city, with cobblestone streets, ancient ruins and beautiful white cathedrals, on which the constant rattling and ringing of the iconic Lisbon trams accompanies the daily life in the picturesque and welcoming capital of Portugal.

There’s no reason to waste your money on roaming fees when traveling to Lisbon. Explore the best eSIM plans to travel to Lisbon and buy the card that best suits your needs.

Best times to visit Lisbon

March-May

One of the best times to travel to Lisbon. Hotel rates and crowds stay at a reasonable level, allowing you to explore the city without too much chaos and hassle. Events like the Festival de Sintra or Moda Lisboa take place during this period.

June-August

Lisbon’s high season. Expect high hotel rates and crowded monuments. The warm weather and the lack of rain surely push Lisboans and visitors alike to stay outdoors. It’s a great time to enjoy open-air events like Rock in Rio or the Nos Alive as well as the more traditional festivities, like the Festas de Lisboa or the Santos Populares festivities.

September-October

The other shoulder season, with cheaper prices and significantly less crowded, Lisbon changes into a more indoor-style of activities, with Fado festivals like the Festival Santa Casa Alfama.

ESIMs, and benefits for traveling

ESIMs stand for embedded SIMs. In simpler terms, eSIMs are downloadable SIM cards, i.e. downloadable “subscriber identity modules” that let you connect to a network service without having the physical version of the card. If you have an eSIM, you can connect to a carrier’s plan without having to physically install a card on your mobile phone. 

The greatness of eSIMs lies in the possibility of switching between several profiles that are stored in your mobile phone without having to extract any of them. You can even use both your SIM card and an eSIM card at the same time. This is the perfect feature for traveling.

Travel eSIMs offer local network service in a different country, so you don’t have to make use of the roaming service from your home carrier, providing a less expensive alternative for your data needs abroad and, since you can use it at the same time as your home carrier’s SIM, you can keep your phone number active for calls and SMS while enjoying the data allowance without incurring in roaming fees.

Best eSIM plans for Lisbon

*Data collected in 2024

MEO Enjoy Portugal: An unbeatable local eSIM for Lisbon.

30GB of data for 15 days

MEO offers an unbeatable travel eSIM plan for Lisbon. This Portuguese carrier provides a prepaid eSIM for 15 days with 30GB of data at an incredible price of €15. It is an unbeatable offer with a price per GB of €0.5. MEO Enjoy Portugal is the best eSIM for Lisbon.

Portugal only

If you’re planning to stay for the entire trip inside of Portugal, this is the best eSIM plan available. You will have access to a local network, without any throttling issues and all the benefits at an excellent price. MEO also has 2 interesting plans for Europe, but they’re overall worse than our second pick Orange eSIM Holidays.

Orange eSIM Holidays: The best travel eSIM for Europe

Incredible price per GB with coverage in Europe

The next best travel eSIM for Portugal is Orange eSIM Holidays. With also 30GB of data at a great price of €25, this eSIM offers coverage for 15 days in several countries in Europe (the 27 countries of the European Union, Norway and Liechtenstein) at an incredible price per GB of €0.83. This is by far the best eSIM if you’re spending a few days touring through Europe.

Unlimited data in Spain

If you’re not only visiting Portugal, but you’re crossing the border and visiting Spain, then this eSIM is the best option: Orange eSIM Holidays offers unlimited data in Spain (60GB at max speed and 2Mbps after that).

Airalo Fofo Mobil

Data only plans for Portugal

Among the many plans Airalo offers for Lisbon and Portugal, its Airalo Fofo Mobil card of 20GB is the best one. With a price of 32 usd (around €29), it provides 30 days of coverage only in Portugal. It is not a great offer when compared to eSIMs like MEO or Orange eSIM Holidays, especially since you’ll need to buy another eSIM if you’re visiting any other country in Europe.

30 days of validity

Airalo offers a longer validity with this eSIM card, but it isn’t necessarily an improvement. 30 days means that you’ll need to stretch its 20GB for a longer period, and with its cost per GB of €1.45, you’ll get a better value with two MEO Enjoy Portugal cards or two Orange eSIM Holidays, in fact, two Enjoy Portugal Cards will only cost you €1 more, and will give you 60GB of data also for 30 days.

Nomad

20GB of data

Nomad also offers for Portugal 20GB of data for 30 days. With no extras since it is also a data only plan, there’s no reason to get this eSIM when MEO or Orange eSIM Holidays are available.

Too expensive

Nomad’s eSIM plan is also quite expensive. With a price of €30.5, it is even more expensive than Airalo’s plan, so it is even worse than any of our first two eSIM plans.

Holafly

Unlimited data and 60 minutes of voice calls

Holafly has unlimited plans for Portugal. All of them offer unlimited data while in the country, but for 15 days (like MEO’s Enjoy Portugal or Orange eSIM Holidays’ cards) their eSIM plan costs €47. With this expensive unlimited eSIM card, you’ll also get 60 minutes of voice calls. It is a pricey plan that forces you to consider carefully the amount of data you will need while in Portugal and only in Portugal.

No tethering

The worst part about Holafly’s plans is that they don’t allow tethering. You won’t be able to share the data with anyone else on your trip via tethering, not even your laptop or your wearables. This means that you’ll be stuck with unlimited data on your mobile phone and nothing else, so you won’t be able to take full advantage of said unlimited data. It is a really inconvenient feature, since remote working might be one of the major reasons to get an unlimited data eSIM, and Holafly’s cards get immediately discarded for this option.

Purchasing an eSIM for Portugal

To buy an eSIM for Portugal you just need internet access. As long as you can see the carrier’s website, you can buy any of the eSIMs available. Select the plan best suited for your trip and after the checkout process and payment, you’ll get an email where they’ll provide you with a QR code and instructions on how to activate your eSIM card.

The greatness of the entire process is that you can buy eSIM cards from anywhere in the world. You can even buy them from the departures area at the airport so you can have one ready before you leave for Lisbon.

Verifying eSIM compatibility

Before buying an eSIM, check the eSIM compatibility list available on the carrier’s website. This should be your primary source to verify that you can install a certain eSIM on your mobile phone. Some eSIM cards are not compatible with every single eSIM enabled device in the market, you can check if your device is compatible by searching for it in this list. If your mobile phone doesn’t show up in the aforementioned list, contact customer support, since they might not have a fully updated list with recent eSIM enabled smartphones.

FAQs about Lisbon eSIM