Nepal eSIM
Data for Nepal on Ncell and NTC, from $9.89. It never expires, tethering is included, and refills land on the line you already have, with nothing new to install.
- Networks
- Ncell and NTC
- Typical speed
- 21 Mbps typical, 5 Mbps at busy times
- 5G
- 4G only
- Throttle
- None on metered plans
- Tethering
- Allowed on every plan
Plans for Nepal
| Data | Validity | Price per GB | Price | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 GB | Never expires | $9.89 | $9.89 | |
| 3 GB | Never expires | $6.30 | $18.89 | |
| 5 GBMost travellers | Never expires | $5.58 | $27.89 | |
| 10 GB | Never expires | $4.99 | $49.89 | |
| 20 GB | Never expires | $4.39 | $87.89 |
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 21 Mbps actually means in Nepal
Typical download speed on Orbislo in Nepal: 21 Mbps. That is below the Asia median of 43.9 Mbps, so plan around it rather than being surprised by it.
The tenth percentile is 5 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 Nepal on Ncell and NTC. 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 Nepal: 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 Nepal
A 1 GB plan for Nepal starts at $9.89, which is $9.89 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 Nepal it means the effective cost is nearer $7.12 a gigabyte than $9.89.
Because nothing expires, the cheapest way to buy for Nepal 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 Nepal
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 Nepal and it attaches to Ncell.
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.
Coverage across Nepal
The figures above cover Nepal as a whole, and a national figure hides real variation. We publish separate figures for Kathmandu and Pokhara, because the difference between a capital and a coastal town is usually larger than the difference between two countries.
Outside the cities, coverage follows the same pattern it does everywhere: the main roads and the tourist corridors are well served, and it thins in the mountains and on the water. No travel eSIM changes that, because it is the same physical network the local population uses. What a multi network profile changes is which of the available towers you get to use.
What is restricted in Nepal
- Who may buy a SIM: The regulator lets operators sell a SIM to a foreign national only against a passport or a refugee identity card. Indian citizens may instead show an Indian embassy identity card or an Aadhaar card, so a visitor from any other country needs a passport at the counter.
- SIMs per person: Each operator may sell no more than two SIM cards in one person's name, with Nepal Telecom allowed three when a CDMA line is counted. A traveller who already holds two lines with one operator cannot register a third there.
- Activation and records: A SIM may be activated only once the customer's full details are in the operator's central database. Operators must record the name and address within 24 hours of the service starting and the full record with a photograph within a week.
- Unused SIMs: Operators are directed to send a re-registration notice for any SIM left unused for six months, and to cancel after notice any SIM that has not been used even once in more than six months. A Nepali number kept for a return trip needs occasional use.
- Ncell tourist plans: Ncell sells its tourist plans only to people who are not Nepali citizens. The physical SIM is registered and activated against the original passport at Tribhuvan International Airport, Ncell Centres and authorised outlets, and a tourist eSIM is sold online.
- Tourist plan expiry: An Ncell tourist plan runs out at the same time of day it was activated rather than at midnight. Once it expires, calls can continue on pay as you go credit, but mobile data works only after another pack is bought.
- Nepal Telecom prepaid validity: On a Nepal Telecom prepaid line each top up buys a set validity period: 25 days for a 50 rupee card, 55 days for 100, 130 days for 200, 330 days for 500 and 690 days for 1,000 rupees.
- Social media block, 2025: On 4 September 2025 the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology directed the telecom regulator to shut off access to social media platforms that had not registered with it, including Facebook, YouTube, X and Instagram. Viber and TikTok had registered and were not covered.
- Block lifted: The block covered 26 sites, among them WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube. The government withdrew it early on 9 September 2025, the communications minister announced, after protests in which 19 people were killed.
- TikTok, 2023 to 2024: TikTok was blocked by Nepal Telecom, Ncell and more than 30 internet providers from 13 November 2023, by a government citing its negative impact on society. The cabinet lifted the ban in August 2024 after almost nine months, on conditions the company accepted.
- Platform registration rules: The Directives on the Operation of Social Networking, introduced in November 2023, require platforms such as Facebook, X, TikTok and YouTube to set up liaison offices in Nepal, and set out a list of prohibited posts for users, including posting through fake accounts.
Worth knowing about Nepal
- Nepal runs a Mobile Device Management System that registers handsets by IMEI, applied from the first day of Jestha 2080 in the Nepali calendar to bring the use and the import of mobile handsets under one register.
- A handset carried into Nepal for personal use and cleared at the customs office is registered in that system automatically. Anything not cleared that way has to be entered by the traveller with a passport and the passport page showing the departure and arrival stamps, or a boarding pass.
- Before buying a phone inside Nepal, the regulator tells buyers to check the handset against the register first, because dealers may only sell devices that are already recorded in it.
- The register has a separate route for a lost or stolen handset, and the regulator asks that the SIM be blocked with the service provider before the device is reported.
- Emergency numbers in Nepal are 100 for police, 101 for fire and 102 for an ambulance. The tourist police, who speak good English, answer on 1144.
- There is no central public ambulance service in Nepal and some private providers operate in the main cities. In a medical emergency the advice is to call the nearest hospital directly rather than a national ambulance number.
- The regulator warns everyone using a Nepali line not to call back unknown foreign numbers that ring them and not to click links in messages from such numbers, and asks that these numbers be reported to info@nta.gov.np.
- Operators may run a promotional offer for no more than three months, and such packages must not renew automatically. Value added services may be renewed only with the customer's consent, and may be charged only after the service is actually activated.
How Nepal compares across Asia
- Regional typical speed
- 42.95 Mbps
- Upstream networks
- 2, Ncell, NTC
- 5G
- 4G only
- Next fastest nearby
- Myanmar, 22 Mbps
- Next slowest nearby
- Afghanistan, 19 Mbps
- Cities with their own page
- 2: Kathmandu, Pokhara
