Best International Calling Rates - From Your Cell!

I thought I'd feature one of the sites from my "favorite websites" section on the sidebar to the right. It's a Swedish company called Rebtel which has the most amazing "virtual calling card" concept. Believe me, I've researched various ways to call internationally for years now, and this is the best and most simple one I've found (also with the lowest rates) - so I'm spreading the love and mentioning them here to make it easier for others as well. I'll briefly explain how it works, but to summarize in one sentence: You'll have a simple entry in your cell phone address book with the name of your friend/relative in Asia/Europe/Africa (wherever) and simply hit the "call" button.

I once used calling cards where I first had to dial a 1-800 number (that would also charge a fee in addition to the minutes used), then select 1 for English or 2 for Spanish, then enter my PIN, then listen to prompts of how much value I have left, then enter the full international number with 011 prefix, country code and area code, etc. After waiting for a few seconds of lag it converted my "value left" into how many minutes I have for this specific call, which usually came out to no more than 10 minutes no matter how much value I had on those cards. Oh, and don't forget the weekly maintenance fee.

But then I discovered Rebtel! Easy-to-use website where I just sign up, add value, and have numbers/contacts saved on the internal (online) address book. The best thing about all of this: each person in my address book is assigned their OWN LOCAL NUMBER! So that means if your area code is, let's say, 123, then you can call uncle Bob in Kurdistan by simply dialing a 123 number. You can do this from any phone - including your cell phone. So you no longer have to deal with phone cards or pay ridiculous international calling rates to your carrier. Even better: Uncle Bob gets his OWN LOCAL NUMBER to use over in his part of the world, which will connect directly to your phone when he dials it.

Rebtel really has incredibly low international calling rates, and their service basically works like a virtual calling card. I'd really suggest giving it a try if you make international calls. Their website lists some examples: India is $0.056 per minute, the UK is $0.019 per minute, and Mexico is $0.02 per minute. And they give you 10 minutes for free when you sign up. For the country I call most, the lowest rate I could find anywhere else was 8 cents. At Rebtel it's only 2 cents. You can sign up with them at rebtel.com, or if you feel like signing up through a referral link, you can click below - I'll get 10 free minutes as well if you do :)