Azerbaijan eSIM
Data for Azerbaijan on Azercell and Bakcell, from $8.89. It never expires, tethering is included, and refills land on the line you already have, with nothing new to install.
- Networks
- Azercell and Bakcell
- Typical speed
- 39 Mbps typical, 9 Mbps at busy times
- 5G
- 4G only
- Throttle
- None on metered plans
- Tethering
- Allowed on every plan
Plans for Azerbaijan
| Data | Validity | Price per GB | Price | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 GB | Never expires | $8.89 | $8.89 | |
| 3 GB | Never expires | $5.96 | $17.89 | |
| 5 GBMost travellers | Never expires | $4.98 | $24.89 | |
| 10 GB | Never expires | $4.09 | $40.89 | |
| 20 GB | Never expires | $3.49 | $69.89 |
Every plan works the moment you land. Unused data returns to your wallet when the line closes, and customers get at least 100 MB of free rescue data a month even at zero balance.
What 39 Mbps actually means in Azerbaijan
Typical download speed on Orbislo in Azerbaijan: 39 Mbps. That is below the Europe median of 71 Mbps, so plan around it rather than being surprised by it.
The tenth percentile is 9 Mbps. That gap between the median and the floor is normal and it is where the frustration lives: the connection is quick most of the time and noticeably slow in the busiest few percent of moments, typically at transport hubs at peak hour.
Maps, messaging, ride hailing and payment apps all work without complaint. Video calls connect but will drop resolution, and streaming is better set to standard definition than left on automatic. Tethering a laptop works for email and documents rather than for calls.
Which networks you will be on
Orbislo carries traffic in Azerbaijan on Azercell and Bakcell. Your phone is not tied to one of them. When the network you are attached to congests or drops, the profile moves you to the other, and it happens without a prompt and without you noticing anything except that the connection kept working.
This matters more than the headline speed. Almost every travel eSIM sold today resells a single upstream agreement per country, so when that one network has a bad hour you have a bad hour with it and your only option is to buy a second eSIM from somebody else. A profile with more than one network behind it can make a decision you never see.
5G in Azerbaijan: 4G only. A well provisioned 4G cell comfortably outruns a congested 5G one, which is why the figure above is throughput rather than a network generation.
What data costs in Azerbaijan
A 100 MB plan for Azerbaijan starts at $0.30, which is $0.00 a gigabyte. That is the number to compare between providers, because a headline price attached to a different allowance tells you nothing.
The comparison most providers would rather you did not run is cost per gigabyte actually used. Independent surveys of travel data put the share of purchased data lost to expiry between 20 and 35 percent, because a plan that expires on day thirty deletes what you did not get through. Orbislo data has no expiry date, so the gigabyte you paid for is still there on the next trip. At the same headline price that is 25 to 40 percent more usable data, and in Azerbaijan it means the effective cost is nearer $0.00 a gigabyte than $0.00.
Because nothing expires, the cheapest way to buy for Azerbaijan is to buy slightly less than you think you need and top up if you run out. Topping up takes about ten seconds and does not involve installing anything. Buying too much is the expensive mistake everywhere else and merely a neutral one here.
Landing in Azerbaijan
Install before you fly, on your home wifi. The profile downloads while you still have a connection you trust, then sits dormant until you land in Azerbaijan and it attaches to Azercell.
On landing there is one thing to check: data roaming has to be switched on for the Orbislo line. It is off by default on both iOS and Android, and it has nothing to do with roaming charges here, because the plan is prepaid and there is no bill to run up. Turn it on for the Orbislo line and leave it off for your home line, and your home number keeps working for calls and bank codes without costing anything.
Worth knowing about Azerbaijan
- A mobile phone or other wireless device brought in from abroad has to be declared to customs, under paragraph 9 of appendix 1 to Cabinet of Ministers decision 305 of 14 October 2013. Failing to declare one carries administrative liability.
- Registering a handset on the state portal depends on that phone already being recorded in the customs electronic system, so the customs declaration at the border comes first and the device registration follows it.
- The declaration can be filed in writing at the border or electronically through a customs kiosk, the customs web portal or the Smart Customs application, and the customs call centre is on 195.
How Azerbaijan compares across Europe
- Regional typical speed
- 71 Mbps
- Upstream networks
- 2, Azercell, Bakcell
- 5G
- 4G only
- Next fastest nearby
- Moldova, 41 Mbps
- Next slowest nearby
- Belarus, 31 Mbps
- Cities with their own page
- 1: Baku
