How to Activate International Roaming? (2024)

Be it a business meeting abroad or a foreign vacation with your family, international travel is not the same as domestic travel. While a few reservations and hotel bookings are enough to prep you for domestic travel, an international one requires you to put in extra time for sorting out visa formalities, learning more about the local culture, and deciding on your international roaming plans for easy communication.

This article will help you understand more about International Roaming Services. Here are a few points we will cover:

• What is International Roaming Service?
• Why is International Roaming Service important?
• How to activate International Roaming for Airtel Prepaid and Postpaid SIM?
• Airtel Best Selling International Prepaid Packs
• Airtel Best Selling International Postpaid Packs

Let’s get started.

What is International Roaming Service?

An International Roaming Service allows users to use their SIM to enjoy voice, SMS, and data services while traveling outside the home country. The users need to activate the IR service to stay connected with their loved ones when traveling abroad. If the service is not activated, it will restrict the users from even getting incoming calls from their home country.

Why is International Roaming Service important?

The International Roaming (IR) service helps users stay active and connected even when traveling abroad. Every international traveler needs to activate this service for the following reasons:

• An inactive IR service can make it difficult for your loved ones to connect with you on call or through any other social media apps. If the IR service is not active for your sim, you won’t be able to receive incoming calls or use data services to place online calls.
• An active IR service helps users to navigate in a new country. Even if your plan is to buy a local sim, you will need your phone for online directions, travel related updates, etc., to assist you in a new and unfamiliar destination. The sim also needs to be active for contacting emergency services.
• The IR service will help you contact your loved ones immediately in case of an emergency.
• You won’t need to rely on unsecured public wi-fi connections to use the internet. Public wi-fi connections are not secure and are prone to cyber threats. You can use your own data with an active IR service.
• Your bank might try to reach out to you on your primary number for reporting fraudulent activities like card cloning or identity theft. If your number is not active, you might suffer heavy losses. Therefore, an active and reachable number in foreign countries is quite significant.

If you are also planning to travel abroad, we highly recommend you activate IR service for your Airtel Prepaid or Postpaid sim. Keep reading to know the detailed steps for activating IR services.

How to activate International Roaming for Airtel Prepaid and Postpaid SIM?

The IR service for an Airtel Prepaid and a Postpaid customer can be activated using the following methods:

• Open the Airtel Thanks app and toggle on for international roaming service.
• Call on 121 if you are in India or +91-99100-99100 (toll-free) if you are outside India to activate IR services by Airtel.
• Send a text on the WhatsApp number 9910099100 for details related to IR packs.
• SMS IRSTART to 121 for activating IR service.

Disclaimer: Prepaid customers need to maintain sufficient balance along with activating IR service to use International Roaming while abroad. The balance can be maintained either by buying a separate IR pack or a talk time recharge to keep their prepaid sim active abroad.

Additionally, ensure the international roaming is switched on your phone for the IR service. You can find the option in the settings app of your phone. Once the IR service is active, you can explore our best-selling IR packs.

Must read : How to enable or disable data roaming on phone?

Here’s a list for your reference:

Airtel International Roaming Plans for Prepaid Connection

Airtel International Roaming Plans for Postpaid Connection

Airtel International Roaming Set 1 List of Countries

Looking for the Airtel International Roaming Pack Set 1 countries? Here is the list:

Airtel International Roaming Set 2 List of countries

Here is the list for Airtel International Roaming Pack Set 2 countries: