Roaming inside the EU stopped costing extra years ago, which is exactly why most people never look at the number again. The catch is that “included” does not mean “unlimited”. Every plan carries a specific roaming allowance, it is almost always smaller than the domestic data figure printed next to it, and it is the one that runs out while you are standing in a station in Lisbon trying to load a ticket. Anyone who travels more than a couple of weeks a year should be choosing on that second number, not the first.
Why the roaming figure sits below the data figure
A plan advertising 160 GB might carry 46 GB of EU roaming. That is not a trick — it reflects how operators settle costs with networks abroad — but it does mean the headline gigabytes describe your life at home, not your life on the road. Read the two as separate budgets and the whole comparison gets simpler.
Five plans, ranked by what they give you abroad
- Lyca Extra, 60 GB — 46 GB of EU roaming, 8.99 euros per 28-day cycle, with the German flat rate for calls and texts included.
- International Plus XL, 160 GB — also 46 GB of EU roaming, 17.99 euros per 28-day cycle, and it adds unlimited international minutes to 100 countries.
- Global Connect XXL, 150 GB — 39 GB of EU data roaming on a 24-month contract, 15.00 euros a month for six months and 25.00 euros after that.
- AloTurka L, 70 GB — 39 GB of roaming that covers the EU and Turkey, 22.49 euros per 28-day cycle, with 100 minutes to EU and Turkish mobile networks.
- International Plus L, 90 GB — 35 GB of EU roaming, 22.49 euros per 28-day cycle, also with unlimited international minutes.
The full conditions for each sit on the current plan overview, and they move with promotions, so check before you commit to any of them.
The result that should change how you shop
Look at the top of that list again. The most affordable plan in the group carries the joint-largest roaming allowance. Lyca Extra costs 8.99 euros and gives you the same 46 GB abroad as a plan costing twice as much. If roaming data is the thing you actually care about, paying more buys you nothing on that particular axis.
What the more expensive plans buy is something else entirely — unlimited international calling, or Turkey folded into the roaming zone. Those are real features and worth paying for if you use them. They are simply not what you are paying for when your priority is a fortnight in Spain with maps, messages and a few evenings of streaming.
There is a second, less obvious reading of the same list. Four of the five are prepaid and run on 28-day cycles, which means you can move up a tier for the month you travel and drop back afterwards. Buying the largest roaming allowance for twelve months to cover two weeks of it is a habit worth breaking, and the prepaid tiers make switching back cheap.
Turning your own trip into a number
Rough arithmetic beats guesswork here. Maps and messaging run to a few hundred megabytes a day. Social feeds with autoplay video are the quiet drain, easily a gigabyte a day on their own. Streaming video at standard quality costs roughly a gigabyte an hour, and tethering a laptop for an evening of work can match a full day of phone use.
Two weeks of ordinary travel therefore tends to land somewhere between 10 and 20 GB, while two weeks with daily video and a tethered laptop can push past 40. Once you have your own figure, the ranking above answers itself, and the roaming details per plan tell you which tier clears it.
Two things to confirm before you travel
First, check whether every country on your route sits inside the plan’s roaming zone. The EU zone and a plan’s own list are not always the same thing, and coverage beyond the EU varies between operators, so read the specific terms rather than assuming. Second, know what happens when the allowance runs out — whether the connection slows, stops, or bills onward — because that single detail decides whether an overrun is an inconvenience or an unpleasant line on next month’s statement.
All figures here were taken from the operator’s own pages at the time of writing, and promotional pricing shifts. We keep re-checking comparisons like this one on flauntchic, so look in again before your next trip is booked.
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