TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums British Virgin Islands BVI Boat Internet/WIFI

We are going with friends to the BVI's in February, 2020. One of them is in medical field and taking classes, and she will need internet/wifi
on the boat. Anyone recently rent this equipment, have any suggestions? So far I've checked with Renport, which is the recommended carrier by our charter company.
Ideas are welcome!

Renport is fine...it is what I use when down there. You have a high speed option

Good to know!

Who are you chartering with? Many of the boats have built in WiFi. Not sure if all the boats have it but the Moorings cat we had last week had very fast WiFi onboard. The Moorings never mentioned it but it was the best internet I have had in the BVI.
G

Horizon also has their boats equipped with wifi.

Moorings uses Renport...you have a regular and faster option

The Moorings has always used report. That is why I was surprised to find very fast onboard WiFi. There was no mention of it or a charge.
G

The cell coverage is really good in the BVIs. Our cell service in the US is AT&T. They have an "as-you-need-it" international plan. It doesn't cost anything to put it on your plan. You pay $10/day when you need it. This includes calls, text, hot spot, etc. We use one phone as the hot spot and connect the other phone, ipad and laptop through it (wifi). We probably use it about an hour to two hours each day. When we researched, we found this to be the most cost effective method.

When you're in the Bight, you get AT&T from St. John's, so no $10 charge on those days. However, if you are calling the BVIs from the Bight it will be a "long distance" call, as if you were in Omaha.

Some companies include the wifi use with the cost of the charter. Horizon and Dream Yacht have wifi on their boats, but the cost is not included.

I believe that all exclusive and exclusive Plus Moorings sailing catamarans have built-in WIFI.

Interesting...I have always had to get the wifi separately at Moorings. I will have to check next time and see if it is different for power cats

My Sprint mobile service works down there with no extra charges

We chartered a boat from St Thomas last year that did not have onboard WiFi. To handle both USVI and BVI we rented a wireless hotspot from

https://www.cellomobile.com

The hotspot worked well (except for in Maho/Francis Bay on the USVI, but I think the cell phone reception is poor there), and handled WiFi for the six of us (perhaps not very intensive). It is cheaper than Renport.

No affiliation to Cello.

It was available on our Exclusive Class monohull in 2018 for no extra charge, but post-Irma coverage was poor. We primarily used a MiFi that I brought along. For 2020 it is available at no extra charge on the Exclusive mono we're chartering. We have friends coming down at the same time on a Club Class who were told WiFi was available but there was a charge to use it on the older boats.

Not sure if it is true for 2020 but in 2018 Renport claimed their setup was better than what came with the Moorings boats, both in coverage and data limit.

The boat WiFi last week on the Moorings boat was excellent. Faster than both T-Mobile and ATT international plans. We were kicking ourselves because we did not even try it until the 2nd night. Strange thing was it was not password protected.
G

I can check but my last boat was <1 year old...again on the power side. I usually get the 2nd tier and then get upgraded to 1st tier boats <1 year...but internet isnt cheap through Renport (~400 for 8 days) so will check it out in May

As George says it is unbelievably fast...I think the infrastructure rebuild post Irma probably has a lot to do with it

We are chartering with horizon.

Thanks for all the info everyone!

Charter with TMM
Problem solved! ALL boats have "free WiFi".

Wes beat me to it but TMM has wifi included.

As someone who is self employed I also sometimes use the international service from Verizon and can use my phone as a hub for the laptop.