Hong Kong eSIM
Data for Hong Kong on CSL and SmarTone, from $5.89. It never expires, tethering is included, and refills land on the line you already have, with nothing new to install.
- Networks
- CSL and SmarTone
- Typical speed
- 92 Mbps typical, 29 Mbps at busy times
- 5G
- yes, non standalone
- Throttle
- None on metered plans
- Tethering
- Allowed on every plan
Plans for Hong Kong
| Data | Validity | Price per GB | Price | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 GB | Never expires | $5.89 | $5.89 | |
| 3 GB | Never expires | $2.96 | $8.89 | |
| 5 GBMost travellers | Never expires | $2.18 | $10.89 | |
| 10 GB | Never expires | $1.59 | $15.89 | |
| 20 GB | Never expires | $1.19 | $23.89 | |
| 50 GB | Never expires | $0.94 | $46.89 |
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 92 Mbps actually means in Hong Kong
Typical download speed on Orbislo in Hong Kong: 92 Mbps. That puts Hong Kong well above the Asia median of 43.9 Mbps.
The tenth percentile is 29 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.
At these speeds nothing on a phone is limited by the connection. Video calls are comfortable, a laptop can be tethered for a full working day, and large photo backups finish without planning around them.
Which networks you will be on
Orbislo carries traffic in Hong Kong on CSL and SmarTone. 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 Hong Kong: yes, non standalone. Worth knowing that 5G on a travel profile is normal rather than special, and that the tenth percentile above is the number that will decide how the trip feels, not the generation label in the status bar.
What data costs in Hong Kong
A 100 MB plan for Hong Kong 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 Hong Kong it means the effective cost is nearer $0.00 a gigabyte than $0.00.
Because nothing expires, the cheapest way to buy for Hong Kong 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 Hong Kong
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 Hong Kong and it attaches to CSL.
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.
Getting a local SIM in Hong Kong
Hong Kong runs a real name registration programme under the Telecommunications (Registration of SIM Cards) Regulation, and every prepaid card supplied by a Hong Kong operator has to be registered before it will activate. A visitor without a Hong Kong identity card registers on another valid identity document.
What is restricted in Hong Kong
- Roaming eSIMs outside the registration rule: Hong Kong's real name rules cover every SIM and eSIM that a Hong Kong licensee supplies for use here, but not a SIM or eSIM from a provider licensed elsewhere that a visitor uses on inbound roaming. Such a roaming eSIM needs no Hong Kong registration.
- Local travel SIMs: A travel SIM from a Hong Kong operator that also works inside Hong Kong has to be registered before it is activated for use here. Only cards that work solely abroad, over outbound roaming, fall outside the rule.
- Documents refused for registration: Anyone who holds a Hong Kong identity card must register a local SIM with that card. Others use a valid passport or travel document, but a Hong Kong SAR passport or a British National (Overseas) passport is not accepted as proof of identity.
- Pre-registered cards: Buying a prepaid card sold as already registered, or registering with false details, can amount to a criminal offence such as obtaining services by deception under the Theft Ordinance. Operators also run sample checks, and a card is deregistered if an irregularity turns up and its user does not help confirm the details.
- Mainland signal near the boundary: Near the Shenzhen boundary and on some outlying islands, a phone can switch to a Mainland China network. Calls and data are then charged as roaming, so setting the phone to select a Hong Kong network manually keeps usage on the local plan.
- Emergency calls on a Mainland network: Dialling 112 or 999 on any local network with coverage reaches the 999 centre. A phone attached to a Mainland network cannot reach it through 00852 112 or 00852 999, so the advice there is to dial 00852 and a Hong Kong police station or a contact.
- Older VoLTE handsets: With 2G and 3G closing, some early 4G handsets that support only an older version of VoLTE may be unable to call 999 or 112 over VoLTE. The regulator tells owners of such phones to ask whether they need a software update or a replacement.
Worth knowing about Hong Kong
- Somebody registering without a Hong Kong identity card also has to state that they do not hold one and that they have not already registered using a different document, which rules out topping up an identity across several cards.
- One person may hold at most ten registered prepaid cards with each Hong Kong operator, and a company at most twenty five, so a group buying cards on one identity runs into a ceiling.
- Hong Kong's Emergency Alert System reaches visitors too. A phone roaming onto a local network receives the government's cell broadcast alerts, free of charge, as long as its cell broadcast feature is switched on, and each alert sounds an alarm with vibration for about ten seconds.
- Alerts at the Extreme Emergency Alert level cannot be switched off or muted, while the lower Emergency Alert level can be turned off. The system needs a 3G, 4G or 5G connection, and it does not reach phones outside Hong Kong's local networks.
- Texting 992 reaches the police only from a number registered in advance under the scheme for people who cannot use 999 because of a speech or hearing impairment. Registration goes through the police online platform or a police station.
- Since 31 December 2024, anyone answering a call from a newly activated Hong Kong prepaid SIM first hears a recorded warning that the call comes from a new prepaid card. People you ring from a freshly bought local card hear it before the call connects.
- On a Hong Kong mobile line, an incoming call that shows a +852 number but originates outside Hong Kong triggers a free voice or text warning: "Call is from outside Hong Kong. Beware of deception." All mobile providers have sent it since 1 May 2023.
- Under the SMS Sender Registration Scheme, registered organisations text local mobile subscribers from sender IDs that begin with #, and the networks block other messages whose sender IDs use # without registration. A # prefix is therefore a mark of a genuine sender.
- Hong Kong levies no value added tax or sales tax of any kind, so nothing of that kind is added to the price of a mobile plan, top up or handset bought here.
How Hong Kong compares across Asia
- Regional typical speed
- 42.95 Mbps
- Upstream networks
- 2, CSL, SmarTone
- 5G
- Yes, non standalone
- Next fastest nearby
- South Korea, 104 Mbps
- Next slowest nearby
- Taiwan, 88 Mbps
- Cities with their own page
- 1: Hong Kong
