Cheapest way to txt USA from UK (and tip x)

born2run83

Hi all

First poster but I'm sure I'll stick around:beer:
I'm currently with Orange pay as you go, What I do at the moment because all I use my mobile for is texting the UK . Is top up £20 a month and then get the 600 free texts which is more than enough for me (i never use my mobile for calls, what the work phones for right? lol)

Here's what might be a bit of a 'tip' actually. Because I don't actually need the £20 that I've then got in credit (only the texts) I go on a service called betnow which allows you to place bets from your mobile phone credit and put any winnings in your bank.. so every month I gamble that £20 and most months I at least manage to make back the £20 (thereby giving me free txts for the month) and sometimes I make a good profit (I've won over £100 many times) If you gamble normally anyway this might be a good idea for you

Anyway my problem is that I now need to text the USA (a lot!!) and the free texts on orange dont allow you to do that and I topped up and found it actually cost 25p a text
Anyone know of the cheapest way I can do it?
My phone is locked to Orange btw but I could get it unlocked or get another phone just to text my girlfriend in the US..

Thanks folks xx

Dave

owitemisermusa

Giffgaff is the cheapest IMHO: 8p/txt.

Stuart_W

Do you have a smartphone, or alternatively happy to send the texts from a computer instead?

If so, check out https://www.fishtext.com. It's a little over 1p per text to USA. The Orange package you are on should include data to use the app.

grumbler

Paradoxically, the cheapest way is to send a UK sim with enabled roaming over there.
Works only for one recipient with a spare (or dual sim) phone, but is free on many tariffs.

mrcamp

AS suggested, try fishtext, or what grumbler said - incoming texts are free anywhere. So, if the person in the US has a UK sim that has roaming enabled( pretty much all the major UK carriers roam out of the box) then you can just text the us based UK sim.

mobilegossip

OP asking cheapest way to text USA. Not recieve a text there.;)

grumbler

And?
Many plans have hundreds or unlimited texts to UK mobiles, but it will cost you, say, 10p to text to USA mobiles.
Roaming UK sim in USA is the cheapest option for sending in the first place, although it costs nothing to receive as well.

Keith99

If the people you text have smart phones & you have one, you can download a program called Whatsapp, this sends text messages over data and the first year is free then £1 a year after that.