SIM Cards and Internet in Chile: Staying Connected on the Carretera Austral and in the Atacama Desert

Chile sets its own particular pace for self-drive travellers: the country splits into blocks that are poorly connected to each other — Atacama, central Chile, Patagonia, the Carretera Austral — often linked by domestic flights rather than roads. Once on the ground, connectivity serves very concrete purposes: checking ferry times on the Carretera Austral (several stretches only cross by barge, with a limited number of daily crossings), checking the weather before heading into the Andean altiplano, or simply confirming a refugio booking in Patagonia, where landlines remain rare.

That vigilance has a documented scientific basis: a landmark study led by Sheila Klauer and coauthors for the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, based on the 100-Car Naturalistic Driving Study, found that visually or manually complex tasks at the wheel — dialling a number, reading a route on screen — roughly triple the risk of a near-crash or crash compared with an attentive driver (study available on Google Scholar: scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Klauer+Dingus+Neale+Sudweeks+Ramsey+2006+impact+driver+inattention+near-crash+100-Car+Naturalistic+Driving+Study). In other words, on the hairpin gravel bends of the Carretera Austral or the tracks of the altiplano, better to plan your route and download your maps before setting off than to handle your phone while driving.

Free includes Chile in the roaming zone of its 350 Go 5G plan: 35 GB usable at no extra cost across more than 115 destinations, from €19.99/month (€9.99 for Freebox subscribers). Since late March 2026, Free Max goes further with unlimited data abroad in more than 120 destinations including Chile, at €29.99/month (€19.99 for Freebox subscribers).

RED by SFR covers the country through its 350 Go 5G plan (35 GB included across more than 130 destinations) or its dedicated Latin America Stay Pack, which includes Chile: around €35 for 20 GB, 60 SMS and 60 minutes of calls over 30 days. Orange offers its Pass Évasion 2 (up to 5 GB, around €29) or its Voyage plan, which adds 40 GB per month usable across around forty destinations outside Europe, Chile included. Bouygues Telecom relies on its 5 GB Internet Travel Pass, active in around a hundred countries including Chile, or its B&YOU Special Voyage (40 GB across more than 110 destinations).

As always with roaming, it's worth checking the exact details on your carrier's customer portal just before departure: allowances and covered destinations change from one year to the next.

At Santiago's Arturo Merino Benítez international airport, all four carriers — Entel, Movistar, Claro and WOM — have a counter in the arrivals area, right after baggage claim and customs. A bare SIM card costs roughly 2,000 to 5,000 Chilean pesos (≈ €2 to €5), plus a tourist data package, typically a few GB up to a few dozen GB for 15 to 30 days. Entel is most often cited as the carrier with the best rural coverage in the country, a real advantage for anyone planning to leave the Pan-American Highway for the altiplano or Patagonia; Claro and WOM generally have the softest prices, with Movistar sitting in between.

One thing worth planning for: since February 2025, new Chilean regulation has required stricter identity verification, including biometric data, to register a prepaid line — a process designed for residents holding a RUT (national ID number). Several travellers reported occasional refusals from Entel, Movistar, Claro and sometimes WOM during 2025 for lack of this number. Shops have since largely clarified the procedure for stays under 30 days, passport in hand, but it's worth having an eSIM as a backup in case a counter refuses the sale on arrival day.

To skip the queue at the counter — and guard against a possible refusal under the new regulation — a tourist eSIM can be activated from an app before you even board. Airalo offers Chile plans from around $5 for a small data allowance over a few days, with more generous tiers for a longer stay. Holafly bets on unlimited data by the day, at a higher price but comfortable for anyone planning to run GPS continuously without watching their data usage.

This kind of eSIM mainly secures the airport-to-rental-agency leg and the first few days in Santiago or the Atacama desert; nothing stops you from switching to a local Entel SIM afterwards if your route heads into Patagonia or the Carretera Austral.

Chilean coverage is solid in the cities and along the Pan-American Highway, the axis that runs the length of the country. It drops noticeably as soon as you leave it. On the Carretera Austral, the legendary road linking Puerto Montt to Villa O'Higgins over more than 1,200 km of gravel and ferry crossings, the network holds up fairly well in the towns along the way — Coyhaique, Chaitén, Futaleufu — but the stretches between them, sometimes several hours of driving, remain largely out of coverage. Better to treat your phone as an offline tool between villages, with maps downloaded and the tank filled in advance.

In the Atacama desert, San Pedro de Atacama picks up a decent signal on both Entel and Movistar, enough to book an excursion or check WhatsApp from the village. But the desert itself — Valle de la Luna, Salar de Atacama, the Tatio geysers, the altiplano lagoons — remains very largely without signal, Entel included, due to the altitude and the lack of antennas away from the main roads: treat it as a fully offline zone. In Patagonia, around Puerto Natales and the edges of Torres del Paine national park, Entel keeps the most reliable coverage, but it fades fast on secondary tracks and during hikes, where a satellite device remains the only real option if something goes wrong.

Chilean law prohibits holding a phone while driving without a hands-free device. Penalties have been noticeably tightened recently: a first offence can now cost up to 3 UTM (a monthly accounting unit revalued each month, roughly 195,000 Chilean pesos, around €190), with a risk of licence suspension for repeat offenders.

A dashboard mount and voice guidance remain the safest combination — especially since on the gravel of the Carretera Austral or the Andean switchbacks, holding the phone to check a route adds real risk to roads that are already demanding.

A few things to check before hitting the road:

Staying connected is only one piece of preparing a road trip in Chile: choosing the right vehicle and insurance before taking the wheel, planning your Carretera Austral itinerary around ferries and seasons, and any crossing of the Argentine border in a rental car all deserve just as much attention before you set off.