Navigating Connectivity at Sea: A Detailed Review of GigSky’s Cruise Ship eSIM

The author received a complimentary eSIM card for this review. All opinions are the author’s own, and GigSky had no input in any part of this review.

Have you ever heard of GigSky? I hadn’t either, at least until one of their representatives emailed me asking to consider adding their product to a review. The premise is simple: You can skip paying for cruise ship Wi-Fi by buying a GigSky eSIM card. You will have nonstop service throughout your trip, and hopefully, you will save money along the way.

I had an upcoming cruise and honestly wondered whether the product would be better than the exorbitant costs of ship Wi-Fi. So, I was set up with a 3GB eSIM card, and off I went.

How did it go? Let’s talk about it.

What Is GigSky?

GigSky sells eSIMs for data services, primarily for international travel. Its offerings are not limited to cruises. You can get eSIM cards for internet access in the air and most locations around the world, even hard-to-reach destinations such as the North Sea.

However, in my opinion, its best use is on cruise ships, where passengers are often stuck paying $20 or more per day.

How Much Does GigSky Cost?

The cost of a GigSky eSIM card depends on where you’re going.

Cruises

For cruising, the pricing looks like this:

• 512MB: $19.99 (valid for 1 day)
• 1GB: $34.99 (valid for 7 days)
• 3GB: $69.99 (valid for 15 days)
• 5GB: $89.99 (valid for 30 days)

Oof. That’s not cheap, especially if you’re used to paying for cheaper eSIM cards when traveling.

Inflight Service

Here’s the pricing for inflight service:

• 100MB: $13.99 (valid for 1 day)

Country and Regional eSIMs

You’ll find quite a lot of variation here when it comes to pricing, so have a look before buying. For example, here’s the cost of an eSIM for Denmark:

• 100MB: Free
• 1GB: $4.49 (valid for 7 days)
• 3GB: $9.49 (valid for 15 days)
• 5GB: $12.99 (valid for 30 days)
• 10GB: $20.99 (valid for 30 days)
• Unlimited: $25.99 (valid for 7 days)
• Unlimited: $42.99 (valid for 15 days)

The fact that you can buy an unlimited eSIM card is pretty enticing, though the website does note that your speeds will be throttled after using 2.5GB in a day.

Bottom Line:

The cost of your GigSky eSIM will vary greatly depending on the service you seek.

Saving Money on a GigSky eSIM Card

You don’t have to pay full price for your GigSky eSIM card. Depending on which credit cards you hold, you can save up to 30% on your purchase or even get them for free.

• U.S. Bank Altitude^® Connect Visa Signature^® Card: Free 5GB, 15-day plans. Unlimited uses but must wait 15 days to get a new eSIM
• Other Visa Signature Cards: 20% off all plans
• Visa Infinite Cards: 30% off all plans

The Visa discount is valid for all plan types, making these eSIM cards much more affordable. Note that for country or regional plans, these discounts drop your prices to lower than what competitor Airalo offers.

Visa Infinite cards that offer the 30% discount include the Chase Sapphire Reserve^®, Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card*×Information collected independently. Not reviewed by Capital One., and Bank of America^® Premium Rewards^® Elite Credit Card.

How To Buy a GigSky eSIM

GigSky is pretty simple to use, though you need to have a phone that accepts eSIMs. This includes most phones released in the last few years. However, be aware that if your phone is on a specific carrier and is still being paid off, it might be locked, which will preclude you from using eSIMs.

To purchase an eSIM, you need to download GigSky’s app. Once it’s downloaded, you can browse the different offerings.

There’s coverage for cruises all over the world, and GigSky makes sure you select the correct plan by asking what cruise line you’re on and where you’re going.

I have a Visa Infinite card, so if I were to purchase the plan myself, I’d get a 30% discount.

After you’ve selected a plan, you’re taken to checkout and then issued an eSIM. It’s a really easy process.

The GigSky Experience

I had high hopes when first downloading and setting up GigSky. After all, I’m so tired of overpaying for cruise ship Wi-Fi, which often charges $20 or more per day. Although GigSky is expensive, I figured that it might be a good alternative for those who don’t need a ton of data when traveling.

Unfortunately, I think GigSky has a lot of work to do when it comes to getting its cruise ship eSIMs up to scratch. It promises a seamless experience whether you’re on land, in port, or at sea. That wasn’t my experience.

The process for setting up the eSIM is complicated in and of itself:

1. Install eSIM.
2. Turn off other SIM cards.
3. Restart your phone.
4. Ideally, at this point, you’re still on shore and your plan begins to work.
5. Wait until you’re 12 nautical miles offshore for the at-sea portion to begin to work.

GigSky notes that you may experience a brief lapse of coverage between leaving shore and getting your Cellular at Sea internet to start. That wasn’t the case for me. No matter what I did on the first day, I couldn’t get the eSIM to work.

I’m no stranger to eSIMs and rely on them regularly when traveling. I know about APNs, different networks, restarting your phone, and using airplane mode to trick your phone into getting a signal. None of it worked for me the first night.

Honestly, it was a good thing I had already purchased Wi-Fi on the ship because otherwise, I would have been absolutely out of luck. This was especially true as I attempted to contact customer service and have them help me, which didn’t work.

Sometime during the night, after I had gone to sleep, the eSIM finally booted up. This was a recurring theme throughout the journey, occurring every time I stepped foot on land and then got back onto the ship. In short, “seamless” was the worst way to describe my experience, and if I hadn’t already paid for Wi-Fi, I would have had absolutely no internet access.

If you end up buying GigSky for your cruise, here’s what worked for me:

1. Install the eSIM.
2. Make sure the APN is set up correctly.
3. Restart your phone.
4. Turn airplane mode on, wait 30 seconds, then turn it off again.
5. Disconnect from any other Wi-Fi source.

Comparing GigSky to Cruise Ship Wi-Fi

So, every once in a while, I got the GigSky plan to work, and when it did, I still had high hopes for its usability. For reference, I was sailing on Royal Caribbean‘s Grandeur of the Seas, an older ship that had recently had SpaceX’s Starlink internet installed.

The price for this internet was $18.99 per device daily, or $94.95 for the entirety of my 5-night cruise. While I had low expectations for its performance, considering everyone else on the ship would be using the internet as well, I was pleasantly surprised by how Starlink performed.

I was able to stream movies without fuss and get any work done that I needed to. While it wasn’t superfast, it did the job. According to Speedtest, my Starlink download speeds were just under 10 Mbps.

I can’t say the same for GigSky, which didn’t crack 2 Mbps.

Note that these tests were done a minute apart, so it’s not like I waited for a different time or more cloud cover. GigSky was so slow that it was unusable.

To be fair, there were times when it was fast enough that I didn’t notice a ton of lag, but overall, it was so slow that I only used half a gigabyte of data throughout the trip, even though I had 3GB available.

Bottom Line:

I thought GigSky was going to be great, but was seriously disappointed by its lack of functionality.

Is GigSky Worth It?

For Cruises

I wanted to love GigSky. Although it was pricey, I really enjoyed the idea of an alternative to paying for cruise ship Wi-Fi. Unfortunately, it didn’t hold up to its promise, and I won’t use it for a cruise again.

However, I do think there are some cases where this might be a good fit:

• You don’t need really fast internet on a ship.
• You’re not planning on using much data at all.
• You don’t want to pay the $20 or more per day to have ship Wi-Fi.
• You’re on an older ship without high-speed internet.
• You have a U.S. Bank Altitude Connect card and can get it for free.

If you’re not a heavy user and want to save money overall, I can see a reason to buy GigSky. After all, you can buy a 7-day plan for $34.99 (or as low as $24.49), which can end up being significantly less expensive than cruise ship internet.

Elsewhere

I haven’t used GigSky’s other offerings, but I’m seriously considering purchasing a country-specific eSIM the next time I travel. Unlike cruise ships, traveling on land with data-only eSIMs is very common, so I don’t expect there to be issues.

With my 30% discount, GigSky’s eSIM cards will be much cheaper than Airalo, which I’ve relied on in the past. We’ll see how it goes.

Final Thoughts

GigSky has an amazing premise, and once they work out the kinks, I’m hopeful that their product will provide a positive experience. While I only used its cruise ship eSIM, it was so frustrating, slow, and dead that I spent most of the time relying on the ship’s Wi-Fi instead. For a product that’s so costly, that’s unacceptable.

On the other hand, the discounts it offers for country-specific eSIMs make it significantly less expensive than competitors’ products, which means I’ll give its land-based eSIM a shot the next time I’m abroad.