Gaborone eSIM
In Gaborone you connect to Mascom or Orange, whichever is performing better where you are standing. The typical speed across the country is 31 Mbps. Your data starts working the moment you land, before you reach the immigration hall.
- Networks
- Mascom and Orange
- Typical speed in Botswana
- 31 Mbps typical, 7 Mbps at busy times
- 5G
- 4G only
- Throttle
- None on metered plans
- Tethering
- Allowed on every plan
Plans that cover Gaborone
| Data | Validity | Price per GB | Price | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 GB | Never expires | $18.89 | $18.89 | |
| 3 GB | Never expires | $13.96 | $41.89 | |
| 5 GBMost travellers | Never expires | $12.78 | $63.89 |
How Botswana compares across Africa
- Regional typical speed
- 29.5 Mbps
- Upstream networks
- 2, Mascom, Orange
- 5G
- 4G only
- Next fastest nearby
- Sudan, 32.1 Mbps
- Next slowest nearby
- Ghana, 31 Mbps
- Cities with their own page
- 2: Gaborone, Maun
Landing at Sir Seretse Khama International Airport (GBE)
- Airport
- GBE / FBSK
- Distance
- 10 km from the centre of Gaborone
Getting into Gaborone
- Botswana Railways passenger service from Gaborone station, currently suspended
Worth knowing about Gaborone
- Sir Seretse Khama International Airport is about 10 km north of Gaborone and opened in 1984.
- The airport is run directly by the Civil Aviation Authority of Botswana, the national regulator, rather than by a separate airport company.
- Scheduled service is almost entirely regional - Air Botswana, Airlink and South African Airways to southern African cities - with Ethiopian Airlines to Addis Ababa the only intercontinental-network connection.
- The runway at Sir Seretse Khama International is 4000 m long and 45 m wide with a concrete pavement, two 7.5 m shoulders and two 60 m stopways, built to ICAO standards and recommended practices.
- The Civil Aviation Authority of Botswana manages six airports: Sir Seretse Khama International, Maun International, P.G. Matante International, Kasane International, Selebi Phikwe and Ghanzi.
- The regulator describes Gaborone's airport as one hour of flying time from Johannesburg and two hours from Harare, and says it has the largest passenger movement in Botswana.
- Botswana Railways states on its own site that its passenger service is currently suspended.
- The Botswana Railways booking form offers only five stations, Lobatse, Gaborone, Mahalapye, Palapye and Serule, so the passenger network reaches nothing west or north of the Francistown line.
- The ticket office at Gaborone BR station opens 5am to 8.30pm Monday to Friday, and 5am to 6am plus 1pm to 8.30pm at weekends and on public holidays. Bookings go to bookings at botrail.bw.
- Orange Botswana states that a national identity document for locals and a passport for foreign nationals are the only documents currently accepted for SIM registration. The document must be handed to a sales assistant in a shop.
- An Orange Botswana SIM cannot be used until identity verification is complete. A line that is not registered within 14 days is suspended, and it is cancelled after 30 days.
- BOCRA says SIM card registration is carried out by the communication service providers and not by the regulator itself, under the Communications Regulatory Authority Act of 2012, and tells the public to visit their operator.
- Botswana's SmartBots Village Connectivity project is installing 1,138 free public wifi hotspots in schools, health facilities and dikgotla across the country, with BoFiNet appointed to deploy the second phase.
- Gaborone was founded in 1964 as a purpose built capital laid out on garden city principles with pedestrian walkways and open spaces. It sits about 15 km from the South African border at 1,010 m above sea level.
- Botswana and Namibia were the first SADC states to implement reduced and harmonised mobile roaming rates, in August 2024. Botswana has since joined five other SADC members under the One Network Area framework.
- BoFiNet, the state fibre wholesaler, is a consortium member of the East Africa Submarine Cable System and the West Africa Cable System, with capacity entitlements of 206 Gbps and 592 Gbps respectively.
- BoFiNet also holds dedicated capacity in the Europe India Gateway and Equiano submarine cable systems, and markets itself as the largest fibre network.
Sources for this page
Other cities in Botswana we cover
- Maun
- 579 km from Gaborone, nearest airport MUB