How to Call home for less. Cheap and Best Calling cards to India
It is very frustrating and often tricky to pick the cheap and best calling cards to call India. Every day there is a new deal coming up and things keep changing. I have tried a lot of calling cards and have had very bad experiences, good experiences too ! I am sharing my positive experiences and recommending the calling cards that I use today which is fairly consistent.
In the past 5 years, here is the list I tried. I started with Letsdial.com, then I moved to RelianceIndiaCall.com, I used to use uspcard.com for cheaper deals, I used Skpye, I used Yahoo Voice, I have been using Reliablecalling.com, Tried AirtellcallHome.com, I use Stanacard.com….apart from these, I randomly tried some calling cards, all of which were bad.
Recommended Calling cards :
- Reliable Calling : https://www.reliablecalling.com/international/ has been very good. I have been consistently using the service for the past 3 years and prices varied according to competition. So, for the money we pay i.e 1 cent a minute, it is very good. Quality is very good. In fact, the truth is, it is 1.5 – 2 cents and not 1 cent. It is part of the service charge. Do NOT take the Monthly plan, they have a cap of 100 min per day. If you plan to talk 100 min a day, then you can take the 24.99 monthly plan. Overall, my experience has been positive. You can use speed dial, I enter only one digit to call home.
- Stana Card : http://www.stanacard.com/en/home.aspx . I have been using this too a lot. It is a bit expensive. I ranges from 4.6 to 3.29 cents. But the service is very good. Never says, the lines are busy. There is a cool feature, you can assign a US Phone number to every India number. So, if you want to call directly from your mobile without entering anything, it is the best choice. I love this feature, it is like calling local. No hassle of entering digits. But, a bit pricey. You get what you pay for.
- Vonage : http://www.vonage.com/ Vonage has come up with a deal of free unlimited calling around the world. If you talk a lot and have the benefit of calling from Home always, you can have it. It is 24.99. But, there is a one year contract. SO, BEWARE of this contract. It is good for Families who call home and stay at home. It looks very tempting, but, there are some disadvantages too, You can only call from home. How often are you when you call India ? Use discretion.
Bad Experiences
- Airtel : https://www.airtelcallhome.com/ Airtel has the worst service ever. I was fooled a lot. The service, always says, your party is not reachable. It is a fake message that it says when the lines are busy. I had the WORST ever experience. Though price looks same, service SUCKS ! DO NOT Buy this ! I have given these guys many chances in the past 6 months and tried many a times , but service never improved.
- Reliance India call is expensive and I have stopped using this 3 years ago. They had good quality before. There is a catch, if you are an old customer of reliance, you cannot sign up for new deals like calling 1 cent per minute. But, overall Reliance is pricey. If you are new, you can try it.
Please post your experiences in the comments section about any other calling cards you recommend or reject !
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Very good suggestions given here!!! i was also using vonage from last one year…now i m moving to a place where internet is provided by society only(included in rent
)
so i m not sure in these scenario’s vonage is best option!!!!!!!!!! any one has used majic jack?? or any other suggestion for the same situation??
You could try Rebtel. I have been using this since 2007 and its the cheapest and the best Calling Card I have ever used.
I had extensively used Reliance and Airtel and now shifted to Rebtel.
rebtel.com
Thanks,
Siva
Hi Ady ! It is a relative call and depends. It completely depends on the area you are living in. For instance, if you are in Midwest, USCellular is good. If you are in South, AT&T is good. Also, another factor is if you buy AT&T and all your friends are on AT&T, then you can call all of them for free, so it is hard to suggest and also depends on How MUCH you want to use the phone. You can adopt pre-paid, if you just want to use it very little. But, I do not recommend prepaid in US.
I have been using AT&T for more than 4 years and I moved places and I find it best. The deal is "Find a buddy with whom you can add line and it will be very cheap". It is called family plan.
So, Sorry I cannot recommend without your requirements.
Could you tell me the BEST and the CHEAPEST mobile carrier that i could buy in the future…???