Best cell provider for Yosemite?

Sorry if this has been asked before, but I haven't been able to find any threads.

I'm coming from out of the country and need to buy a prepaid SIM for my phone. Getting service on El Cap is gonna be clutch, else my wife will kill me. Which provider/company works best in Yosemite?

I have Verizon and usually have decent service on/around El Cap

Another vote for Verizon, but it can still be sketch. As always, text msgs work better than voice.

Kevin DeWeese wrote:

Quinn uses Sprint and always has better reception and call ability than me. 

It’s actually T-Mobile now.. I had Sprint, and it was so so, then when T-Mobile bought Sprint and combined the networks it got a lot better.. my service is best on El Cap and less good around the valley and Washington’s Column.. but still good enough on the column 

Edit:

reading the other responses- sounds like T-Mobile is the best - I get Texts, Voice, FaceTime to the family and shockingly good access to web/social media..  

Verizon has always been best, but sounds like T-mobile has caught up. The higher up you are, the better it is, generally speaking. On EC, you should be fine, at least for texts. You will likely have to push them out as "send as txt message" rather than iMessage, at least on weekends. During the week is typically pretty good for getting any kind of message out. Phone calls generally go through for me, at least up higher. Have fun.

Verizon has always  been a good provider for me in Yosemite. 

Verizon is Far and Away the best but AT&T will work where you will be climbing on Virginia

Thanks everyone. Verizon it is. 

What I’ve done when I really needed service is to buy a hotspot or get an e-sim from another provider or even two.  That way you can have two or three provider options.  This is obviously an additional cost but might be worth it depending on how important it is to get a message out.

Mikey Schaefer wrote:

What I’ve done when I really needed service is to buy a hotspot or get an e-sim from another provider or even two.  That way you can have two or three provider options.  This is obviously an additional cost but might be worth it depending on how important it is to get a message out.

Google Fi uses multiple networks and can essentially allow you to do this with one phone. A friend has Fi and she gets service all sorts of weird places where where I don't on just Verizon alone. 

Ricky Harline wrote:

Google Fi uses multiple networks and can essentially allow you to do this with one phone. A friend has Fi and she gets service all sorts of weird places where where I don't on just Verizon alone. 

Ah, it looks like it used to switch between t Mobile, sprint, and US Cellular but since the t mobile acquisition of Sprint it's now just T Mobile and US Cellular... So mostly just T Mobile. For some reason I was under the impression it used AT&T also, my bad. 

Kevin DeWeese wrote:

God damnit Ricky 

Ricky seems a bit large for a nit...also, that's rude (but par for the course)  ;) 

I would wager large sums that at least 75% of america uses the "double-m" spelling, at least in casual conversation. Yay for thread derailment, my life goals are complete! :)

Also, more anecdotal (and, according to KD, basically useless) data points, I've generally seemed to have the stronger service between a partner with another provider in other parts of the valley, but EC seems to be an equalizer, with most everyone I've climbed with (at least 3 diff providers that I know of) having similar signal strength and ability to get messaging out from at least 5-6 pitches up the wall. 

"Good lord your reading comprehension is horrible."

Phallic swinging contests are my favorite, and a phenomenal use of my finite time on earth… ;)  ah yes, the ol' "I 99% implied 'abcdef' as strongly as possible but AKSHUALLY I didn't say those *exact* words, so neener neener booboo." KD, MP would be so boring without you.

Kevin DeWeese wrote:

Lol…Sharing one's personal experience with a single provider is valuable for gathering general data about that specific provider, but when it comes to the question of comparing services, the only responses that matter are those that actually, you know... compare providers from the same point on el cap at the same time of day on the same date. Yes, Person A can get a phone call out on X provider, but is that call better than the one Person B might get from the same place on Y provider? the data being provided doesn't really answer that…

I'm just waiting until all the providers merge into a single megacorp, effectively ending this debate once and for good . That seems to be the way things are going these days.

I can say with confidence the strongest signal comes from the visitor center, and they beefed it up (technical lingo) significantly last year. I was surfing the web at mach speed over there on Verizon. Due to the way the waves bounce from the visitor center over to Sentinel and back to El Cap, service is better on the southeast face. I was only BARELY able to load NWS on the Salathe Wall last spring. Wish that page hadn't loaded at all, we would have continued upward unwittingly into electrical storms.

I Vote that Me- DeWeese aka “FailFalling”Christian aka “Sub4” and JT aka “ima watch you haul to Mammoth” -all do an El Cap route together this fall and attempt to Test all known cell providers at every anchor- between shit talk and cat fights.. 

Kevin, stop trying to gaslight, it’s silly coming from an edumacator. (and pretend to have better grammar, geezus)

Quinn, I’m in, but only IAD, I don’t know how to haul ;)

Verizon 

Or just get an inreach. You can text from those

Kevin DeWeese wrote:

I’m in. I call Att, Quinn calls T-Mobile, Christian calls Verizon, sorry J(watchinghaulingbetterthanhauling)T you have to get chirp mobile 

I'm in.

Good weather, bad weather,  now or later

Any time a good time to jug the lines .

I'll bring my torch. When we light the beacons, they will know that gondor calls for aid !!