How to Use Mint Mobile's Minternational Pass
I’ve been a Mint Mobile customer for years. It’s a great, and inexpensive, service that works well.
But my problem was that I didn’t know how to use the Minternational Pass, and I couldn’t find much information about it.
This year, my daughter (on my family plan) and I traveled internationally to two different countries. So, I used Minternational Passes for both of us.
Purchasing
First, for my daughter, she had to request the Minternational Pass from her phone, which she did, and then I bought it from my phone and she could then activate it when she landed in Costa Rica.
I bought a pass for myself at the same time I bought her pass. They don’t expire for 360 days, so you can buy it early, or right when you get there.
The buying process is very simple, just tap “MINTL PASS” on your phone in your Mint Mobile account:
Then, you can choose which one you want to purchase, I went for the 10GB data with 500 minutes of talking, 500 text messages:
It cost $20 for all the access I needed while in Japan. I was there for a week, so I opted for the 10 day plan.
Also, you don’t need to activate before you leave, because if it’s an available country, it will activate when you get there.
Why Minternational Pass?
The other two people I was traveling with used a different eSIM Provider and they missed out on a few things:
- Their phone numbers didn’t work anymore.
- SMS Messaging was out completely for them.
- iMessages that only had phone number connected would not work.
- In fact, since they’ve been back, they’ve had a few text groups where they’re now in there twice! Madness!
Activating
Upon landing in Japan, I took my phone out of airplane mode, and it started searching for a signal.
Within about 30 seconds, I got a text from Mint saying:
Hey jetsetter. Need a Minternational Pass? Text one of the following to 6700:
GO1DAY - $ 5 60 mins, 60 texts, 1GB.
GO3DAY - $ 10 200 mins, 200 texts, 3 high-speed GB with unlimited 3G speeds afterwards.
GO10DAY - $ 20 500 mins, 500 texts, 10 high-speed GB with unlimited 3G speeds afterwards.
ACTIVATE - Activate your earliest stored pass
A couple seconds later, I got another text that said:
Mint Mobile: Hey jetsetter. You've got a Minternational Pass. If you're ready to roam, text ACTIVATE to 6700, or check if Wi-Fi is available to activate in the app https://m.mintmobile.com/48KPrYr
I texted back “ACTIVATE”
And a few seconds later, I got this message:
Welcome jetsetter. You're ready to roam with your 10-Day Minternational Pass. Text GOROAM to 6700 to see your balance at anytime. Want to roam like a pro? Check out these tips and tricks https://mintmobile.com/features/international-roaming.
Data Speed
Having the internet in your pocket isn’t very useful if it isn’t fast enough to give you what you need. I was worried about Mint Mobile (being a budget carrier) even though they do have 5G in the states, being able to give me good service in Japan.
Turns out Mint Mobile’s Minternational Pass gave me 5G most everywhere I was in Japan. Deep in the bowels of the train station and out at the coast, I still have great service, full bars and almost always 5G. If it wasn’t 5G it was fast LTE. I don’t even know what kind of cell towers they use in Japan, and because of the simplicity and ease of Mint Mobile’s Minternational Pass, I didn’t even have to worry about it.
Unfortunately, I didn’t do a speedtest, because I didn’t even think to, because it never felt like my internet on my phone was sketchy.
Experience and Usage
And just like that, the Minternational Pass worked just great. I had great service in Japan. And, I used almost exactly half of what my allotment was. I used one minute of calling because my daughter called me and then we switched to FaceTime.
What did I use for all my data? Well, it was mostly maps for directions and translate for communicating. I did use social media, and search for looking up different things.
Btw, the Arc Browser “browse for me” search function was amazing to learn about where I was in Japan. I used that a ton. You just type in anything, and then it searches and organizes information for you. It’s amazing. So much better than Google.
I did change my photos to not upload using cellular data, because I took a lot of those and used the hotel wifi to upload them. And I used my phone like normal for everything else. It seems that there was plenty of data for me to get around, use translate and transit passes, as well as get directions.
Get Mint Mobile and Minternational Passes
If you’re not a Mint Mobile user yet, I really like this service. I pay once per year, and it costs $960 for four lines, for a whole year! If you use this link, you’ll save $15.