Communications

Staying connected in Indonesia is cheap and, for the most part, easy. The old picture — unreliable phone lines and a post office you could only pray at — is long gone. Mobile data is inexpensive and reaches almost everywhere, home fibre has arrived across the towns and cities, and a fiercely competitive courier industry now moves parcels across the archipelago faster than the state post ever managed.

Three mobile networks share the country between them, and a prepaid SIM with a generous data allowance costs less than a modest lunch. Foreign residents register a SIM in person at an operator's outlet, using a passport and, if resident, a KITAS. Home broadband is straightforward to arrange in any decent-sized town; where the cables do not reach, fixed wireless and satellite increasingly fill the gaps. Fixed-line telephones survive mainly as a relic, mobile having replaced the landline for almost every purpose.

For letters, documents and packages, most people now rely on the private couriers rather than on Pos Indonesia, though the old postal service still earns its keep for remote corners and international mail.

The pages below take each of these in turn. Operators, prices and rules change quickly in this corner of Indonesian life, so treat any specific figure as a starting point and check it before you commit.

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