Not only in Japan but also in other countries, people have roughly two choices for their usage to activate their mobiles in Japan, which are,
- to use unique mobile carrier’s network
- to use wifi by catching signals from free wifi LAN or through paid wifi router.
Lately, IP phone’s technology (What’s app , LINE, Wechat etc,) is remarkably progressive which provide quality sounds and connectivity as comparable to the ones of mobile carrier’s unique mobile network.
There may be someone who doesn’t want to burden fixed living costs as much as possible except for an apartment rent until your financial situation settles down by monthly stable salary for a couple of months from the day you start living in Japan.
People who are worried about the above thing may come up with the idea to ensure personal contact means by IP phone though internet and to think about contracting reasonable portable wifi router.
Yes, this is one of the solution you have to save your living costs in Japan. However, wifi router with short term contract tends to be much more expensive than the one with long term contract. After all, It is very standard in communication industry that cost reduction of any plans is in proportion to how much longer you can keep a contract.
In other words, the shorter term contract you make, the more expensive the usage charge becomes. For people who want to avoid fixed monthly charge, this is very heavy news.
Additionally, there are some disadvantages of data plans of wifi router in terms of the connecting speed depending on the plans you selected and connectivity depending on which wifi contractor you choose, which may make you stressful if those quality is really bad.
To connect the internet, the cheapest choices you could make without fixed monthly charge are just two
- Prepaid SIM
- Rental Wifi router
Contents
Let’s compare the cheapest price between wifi router and pre-paid SIM
7days prepaid SIM & rental wifi router
U-mobile Pre-paid SIM
| Usage Period | 7 days |
|---|---|
| Data Capacity | 1.5GB/ month (220MB / day) |
| Price | 1,944yen |
| URL | U-mobile page |
| If you pay per month | 7,776yen |
SoftBank Rental portable wifi
| Usage Period | 7 days |
|---|---|
| Data Capacity | 4GB / month (750MB / day) |
| Price | 3,680yen |
| URL | Rakuten Selling Page |
| If you pay per month | 14,720yen |
Major morile carrer’s regular SIM contract and wifi router
SoftBank’s regular mobile plan
| Usage Period | 2 years |
|---|---|
| Data Capacity | 20GB / month |
| URL | Mobile Plan Page (Japanese) |
| Price (monthly) | 9,765yen |
SoftBank’s regular wifi plan
| Usage Period | 3 years |
|---|---|
| Data Capacity | 20GB / month |
| URL | Wifi Plan Page (Japanese) |
| Price (monthly) | 5,071yen |
How much is the difference between regular type and prepaid type
| SoftBank’s rental portable wifi plan | 14,720yen / month | U-mobile Pre-paid SIM | 7,776yen / month |
|---|---|---|---|
| Soft Bank’s regular portable wifi plan | 5,071yen / month | SoftBank’s regular mobile plan | 9,765yen / month |
| Price difference | -9,649yen / month | Price difference | -1,989yen / month |
If you contract regular wifi plan, you can save 113,532yen yearly compared to rental wifi plan and if you contract regular mobile plan you can save 23,868yen yearly compared to prepaid prepaid mobile SIM plan
Under the circumstances of mobile plan’s competition among each mobile carrier’s in Japan, each mobile carriers at the head of 3 big major mobile carriers (AU, Softbank, Docomo) corral customers with long term fixed contract.
In the long run, contracting regular plan is much better to save your budget if you live in Japan for so long.
If you are really worried about making fixed term contract because you already burdened a lot of initial costs for moving in to Japan and cannot help drawing from your savings little by little until stable salary comes into your savings account, you should put your blinders on this expensiveness for a moment if you ensure your contact means without locational restriction.
If you pursue cheapness in this expensiveness, pre-paid SIM should be your choice,. However, connectivity and speed are not better than a rental Wifi router though.
Using public wireless LAN
If you don’t want to waste the costs of even wifi router or pre-paid SIM and accept locational restriction, you can only choose to use public wireless LAN. Once you register wifi provider, you can connect wifi freely whevever there are wifi spots
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
|
|
Japan Connected-free WiFi
| The number of installation spots | 1,400,000 spots |
|---|---|
| Necessity of registration | Need to register |
| Initial costs | 0 yen |
| Languages | English, Chinese, Korean, Thai, Malaysian, Indonesian, French, Spanish, German, Italian, Russian |
| URL | Japan Connected-free Wi-Fi |
| Download Apps | iOS Android |
Japan connected-free WIFI is for foreign tourists and developed by subsidiary of NTT. Nowadays, major convenience stores, major airports, JR major stations, Tokyo Metro, IEON mall, Mitsui shopping park affiliates with wifi.
Japan Travel free WiFi
| The number of installation spots | 2,000,000 spots |
|---|---|
| Necessity of registration | Need to register |
| Initial costs | 0 yen |
| Languages | English, Chinese, Korean, Thai, |
| URL | TRAVEL JAPAN Wi-Fi |
| Download Apps | iOS Android |
“TRAVEL JAPAN Wi-Fi” is smart phone application provided by Wire & Wireless (Wi2).
A network possessed by Wi2 covers restaurants, public transportation. There are more than 200,000 access points all over Japan.
Wi2 300 Public Wireless LAN (paid)
| The number of installation spots | 2,000,000 spots | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Necessity of registration | Need to register | ||||||||
| Available area stickers |
|
||||||||
| monthly flat rate plan | 362yen | ||||||||
| Wi2 300 One Time Plan |
|
||||||||
| Languages | English, Chinese, Korean, Thai, | ||||||||
| URL | Wi2 Wire & Wireless | ||||||||
| Download Apps | iOS Android, PC windows , PC macOS |
| Monthly flat rate plan | Wi2 300 One Time Plan |
|---|---|
| You can use addtional 60,000 access spots other than basic areas | You can use 200,000 access spots in total |
Public wifi’s primary disadvantage is that you can’t use wifi timely when you want to use it. If you work for a company, you should prepare your personal contact means as you can pick up your phone whenever you are and whenever it is. Public wifi spot is of course very reasonable to use but this is not timely contact means. Don’t scrimp this initial investment regardless of whether you get first salary in Japan or not.