3 Free Ways to Communicate with People back in the US while Abroad

Living abroad means suddenly facing small logistical challenges that you've never thought of before arriving in your new home. For us, one of these challenges was how to call and text those back home. We wanted to find a way to do this easily and without spending a bunch of money every time. We've tried several different approaches and wanted to share them with you here.

1. Make calls using Google Voice

Google Voice (Link Here) is a free service that lets you create a unique US Google Voice number. You can route calls from multiple numbers to the service and call internationally (for a fee). Importantly, Google Voice allows calls between U.S. numbers for free.

When abroad, you need to update the Google Voice app to use wifi or data, instead of your cellular network. If you don't do this, you'll be calling from your local number and will be charged the international rates. Toggling over to wifi/data lets you use your local plan or wifi to call from your Google Voice number to any U.S. number absolutely free. You can send texts as well!

Google Voice can call any number—there is no requirement that they use Google Voice. This feature makes it the best option for calling any American number for free.

2. Send messages using WhatsApp

What's app is the global standard when it comes to messaging. You can send anyone a message using data (wifi or cellular data) using their home country phone number. Since it uses data, it can be done for free over wifi or through the data plan without any international charges.

WhatsApp also provides end-to-end message encryption, which ensures your messages are secured. This is extra important if you're using free and/or public wifi hotspots.

WhatsApp also supports calls—which is great if you're trying to call other people who have WhatsApp. Most of my calls to American numbers are to banks, doctors, or landlines, though, so I prefer Google Voice for calls.

3. Keep using iMessages (with a very important tip)

If you have an iPhone, chances are pretty good that your texts use iMessage (the blue text bubbles). The good news is that Apple's iMessages use data and not a cellular network. So, as long as you have data, you can continue to iMessage without incurring any charges.

However, we ran into challenges when we first moved abroad with our iMessages. With our local SIM cards, people that we had been iMessaging with for years couldn't receive our iMessages. The text bubbles were green, which means our phone was trying to use the cellular network to send it. If they had gone through, the fees would have been quite steep.

The problem was that we didn't have the country code in front of the phone number in our contacts. Adding the +1—for the US—before the rest of the number allows Apple to recognize the number as iMessageable once again. So make sure you add the country code to the contacts you're messaging.

Let us know in the comments if you find these helpful or if you have any other suggestions on ways to communicate internationally for free!