Why some eSIMs reach TikTok and ChatGPT and others do not.
When you use an eSIM abroad, your phone connects to a local network in that country. But your internet traffic does not necessarily leave from there.
Most travel eSIMs use home-routed roaming. Your traffic is tunnelled back to the eSIM provider’s own network first, and only then goes out to the internet. So your IP address follows the provider’s location, not where you are standing.
That matters because some services restrict access based on where traffic comes from. Hong Kong is one of the most common cases, and the effect shows up in the apps you use every day.
We show this label on the plan page and on the plan card, so you know before you pay. A plan labelled Smart means its traffic breaks out outside Hong Kong.
Availability can still change and depends on each service’s own policy and on your location. The routing label removes the Hong Kong side of the restriction, but we cannot guarantee access to a third-party service.
Not every plan states its routing. For those that do not, we make no claim about it, because the provider does not give us the data. If routing matters for your trip, choose a plan whose label is shown.
