Cell Phones in India

Don't assume that your United States cell phone will work in India. Unless your phone has the capability to work on the frequency on which Indian phone companies transmit, you US or European phone will not work in India.

You can hear a particular radio station only if you tune in to the exact frequency it is transmitting on.

The same goes for cell phones. While you do not manually change frequencies on your cell phone, they are preprogrammed to work on certain frequencies.

Cell phone frequencies used in India

Their are five frequencies used today by most cell phone companies around the world. They are:

•  800 MHz, 850 MHz, 900 MHz, 1800 MHz, and 1900 MHz

Sim Card for India

To use your foreign phone in India, if it is capable of handling the Indian frequencies you will have to buy a sim card in India.

Sim cards are available at just about every major corner in the larger cities. Due to increased terrorism concerns their has been a check on the issuance of Sim cards in India. Unless proper Identification is provide it is no longer possible to buy a Sim card in India. 

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Using your foreign cell phone in India 

You can buy a cell phone today that can work on only one, two, three or four frequencies. When shopping for a cell phone you will often be told that a particular cell phone is dual band, tri band or quad band.

A dual band phone is capable of working on two frequencies, a tri-band will work on three and a quad band will be capable of working on four different frequencies.

 Usually these phones are capable of auto detecting the frequency so no manual setting is required from the cell phone users. Quad band phones are also referred to as world phones.

When buying a cell phone abroad make sure that the phone you are buying is capable of working on 900 MHz as this is the frequency used by most cell phone companies in India.

Don't get taken in by salesmen who tell you that 850 MHz will work in India. It should be 900 mhz.