Singapore eSIM
Data for Singapore on Singtel and StarHub, from $5.89. It never expires, tethering is included, and you install Orbislo once rather than once per trip.
- Networks
- Singtel and StarHub
- Real speed
- 119 Mbps median, 42 Mbps for the slowest tenth688 travellers, rolling 90 days
- 5G
- yes, standalone
- Throttle
- None on metered plans
- Tethering
- Allowed on every plan
Plans for Singapore
| Data | Validity | Price per GB | Price | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 GB | Never expires | $5.89 | $5.89 | |
| 3 GB | Never expires | $2.63 | $7.89 | |
| 5 GBMost travellers | Never expires | $1.98 | $9.89 | |
| 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 plan ends, and there is 100 MB of free rescue data on your account even at zero balance.
What 119 Mbps actually means in Singapore
Travellers on Orbislo in Singapore see a median download of 119 Mbps, measured across 688 real sessions rather than a speed test we ran ourselves. That puts Singapore well above the Asia median of 43.9 Mbps, and 2nd out of the 159 destinations we have measured.
The tenth percentile is 42 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 Singapore on Singtel and StarHub. 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 Singapore: yes, 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 Singapore
A 100 MB plan for Singapore 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 Singapore it means the effective cost is nearer $0.00 a gigabyte than $0.00.
Because nothing expires, the cheapest way to buy for Singapore 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 Singapore
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 Singapore and it attaches to Singtel. Median time from tapping install to having service across all Orbislo orders is 41 seconds.
On landing there is one thing to check and it is the thing that goes wrong about sixty percent of the time people tell us they have no service: 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 Singapore
A SIM card is registered against a government issued identity document, and registering online runs through Singpass. A foreign passport may not be used to register a postpaid line at all, which leaves prepaid as the route open to a visitor.
What is restricted in Singapore
- Passport registered SIMs: Under IMDA rules in force since 15 July 2024, a prepaid SIM registered with a passport stays valid for 30 days. Keeping it longer means re-registering within those 30 days with a Singapore issued identity card or work pass; otherwise the card is suspended without refund.
- Calls on tourist SIMs: Singtel sells its hi! Tourist plans to foreign passport holders only, and registration with a passport gives data features only. Local calls and SMS stay switched off until the traveller visits a Singtel hi! retailer in Singapore and shows the passport.
- Passing on a local SIM: Since a law passed on 2 April 2024, handing over a SIM or eSIM registered in your name, or letting someone register one with your particulars, is an offence when you know or have reason to believe it will be used unlawfully. The penalty is a fine of up to S$10,000, up to three years in prison, or both.
Worth knowing about Singapore
- One person may register at most three prepaid SIM cards across all Singapore telcos put together. The ceiling was cut from ten to three in April 2014 and has stayed there since.
- From 28 February 2026 one person may register at most ten postpaid SIM cards across all telcos put together, replacing an earlier limit of ten per telco. Corporate subscriptions and data only cards that cannot call or text are left outside the count.
- Registration happens at the point of sale and is compulsory. The buyer must present an original document, not a copy, and for a foreign visitor that document is the passport.
- Police emergencies are 999, and fire and ambulance emergencies are 995, with 1777 for an ambulance that is not urgent. A mobile phone from abroad that dials 112 or 911 is redirected to 999.
- Police also take emergency texts at 70999 when calling 999 is unsafe or impossible, such as when speaking would give away where you are hiding. The police operator replies to confirm the message arrived, and ordinary SMS charges apply to the sender.
- Every Singapore telco offers its mobile and home phone subscribers a free setting that blocks all incoming calls and texts from international numbers. A local contact who has it switched on will not receive a call or SMS from a visitor's foreign number, while calls from Singapore numbers still get through.
- Since 31 January 2023, any organisation texting Singapore numbers under a name instead of a phone number must be registered with the SMS Sender ID Registry, and names that are not registered arrive labelled Likely-SCAM. A code sent to a local Singapore line by an unregistered foreign sender lands under that label.
- Wireless@SG public hotspots at MRT stations, malls, hawker centres and community centres sign users in with a one-time SMS code, and that code can be sent to a foreign mobile number as well as a local one.
How Singapore compares across Asia
- Speed rank
- 1 of 28 destinations we have measured in Asia
- Regional median
- 42.95 Mbps
- Consistency
- The slowest tenth still reaches 35 percent of the median
- Upstream networks
- 2, Singtel, StarHub
- 5G
- Yes, standalone
- Next slowest nearby
- South Korea, 104 Mbps
- Cities with their own page
- 1: Singapore
- tenth percentile
- 42 Mbps
- Behind these figures
- 688 travellers, rolling 90 days
