How do I get online in my van?

Warning! This is a long article, so put the kettle on. But if you persevere you should get a full understanding of mobile internet, with minimum jargon.
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Nothing seems to generate more confusion and questions than getting internet in a vehicle.

So here at last is what I hope is the definite answer, in simple language.

There are two methods to get online while out and about - WiFi hotspots, or through the mobile networks - Orange Vodafone etc.

But first we have to deal with terminology - the use of the word "WiFi". Many people now use the word WiFi to mean the internet in general, and most of the time we know what they mean. "Is there any Wifi?" generally means "is there any internet?".

But the true definition is that WiFi is just a delivery system - it is not actually the internet. But because WiFi is everywhere it's easy to see why it has become a generic word. Just about every home computer, gaming console and hand held device nowadays connects to the internet via WiFi. 

Access via public WiFi

In order for WiFi to work, it has to be broadcast by a router, and that router must be connected to the internet. Most of us are familiar with this because at home, we have a broadband connection that delivers internet down the phone line to the router, and the router broadcasts WiFi so that all our devices can connect to the internet. We also know that if you go too far away from the router, the signal becomes weak and eventually fails.

As well as your home WiFi, there is also public WiFi at bars, restaurants and airports etc. This works in exactly the same way as at home in that somewhere in the business building there is a router that is connected to the internet (usually via broadband over a phone line) and it broadcasts a WiFi signal for customers to log on to - sometimes with a password which is provided by the business, sometimes no password is needed. McDonalds is quite famous for offering free WiFi in its restaurants, and this often extends into the car park which sometimes enables you to sit in your vehicle and use their WiFi.

There are thousands and thousands of these WiFi "hotspots" as they are known, all over the country, all over the EU, all over the world. They are very popular. The advantages of WiFi hotspots is that they are usually free and are not limited to how much data you can use. However the disadvantage is that they can get very busy and are often quite slow as a result. It is similar to the situation at home with a big family - if everybody is online at the same time, the speed will often be slower, because a fixed line speed is being shared by several users - it's the same with public WiFi. Many people will be familiar with the internet being really slow or unusable when using a busy public hotspot.

So using Wifi to access public hotspots is one way of getting online, and if you are in a vehicle, and your vehicle is in range of the hotspot then you can also get online from inside your vehicle this way. However you can often be frustrated because you may not be able to get close enough to get a reliable signal. It is the same on campsites that offer WiFi - if you are too far away from the router then you either get a slow patchy connection compared with somebody who is closer - or maybe no signal at all.

The reason for this is that routers only broadcast the WiFi signals with so much power, and this power is limited by the regulations. It is designed as a short range service, so that many routers can broadcast on the same frequencies without interfering with each other. Generally speaking, the power is designed to be just enough to cover the average house. But as many will know, this isn't always the case. Radio waves don't like travelling through brick walls or metal, so you often get a situation where one room has a weak or no signal, or that the signal will just cover outside the house, but won't extend to the bottom of the garden. Every situation is different. The other reason why this is so is that although the router usually has a decent sized aerial on it, the receiving devices - phones and tablets etc, usually have much smaller built in aerials - aerials that you can't even see because they are built in to the device - usually round the edge of the screen.

So it follows from this that if you had a bigger aerial, then you could receive WiFi further away from the router. But it is impossible to fit a bigger aerial to a phone or tablet, so the tech world came up with the concept of the WiFi extender. This is a device that looks similar to a router, almost identical in fact. It has one or two aerials on it - nice big ones! This device, also called a repeater, receives the original signal from the router and then re-transmits it through its bigger aerial, with the result that devices now have a stronger signal to connect to. So for example, if your original router was in the living room at the front of your house, but could not be received down on the patio at the back of the garden, installing an extender/repeater in the back bedroom window would probably be enough to extend the signal down the garden. As long as the extender/repeater is within range of the main router it can the rebroadcast the WiFi signal over a wider area and everybody is happy. The extender/repeaters can even be daisy chained together so that a large building can be covered quite easily. 

The same thing applies to a vehicle. WiFi reception in a vehicle is a particular problem because most vehicles have metal bodies, and metal is a terrible material for radio waves to travel through. In fact the only way radio signals can get inside a metal vehicle is through the windows. This is why things often seem to work better near windows. Many people in vehicles, in particular motorhomes and campervans, can benefit from using a WiFi extender/repeater in their van. In this situation the extender would use it's bigger aerial to pull in the WiFi signal from, say, a restaurant or bar, and then rebroadcast it inside the van so that all the van occupants can use it. You still have the same problems as you would have if you were sat inside the bar or restaurant - if it's slow and busy in the restaurant it will be no better in the van.

You can improve things even better in terms of distance by using an even bigger aerial than the one supplied with the repeater/extender by buying a roof mounted aerial and connecting it to the box by coax cable. This is known as an external aerial. The golden rule of all radio aerials is that they need to be as high as possible and as big as possible. Radio waves travel in straight lines, so being up in the air is a huge advantage. A bigger aerial like the ones that attach to the back of a router or extender is at least 10 times more efficient than the little one built into a phone or tablet - and an aerial on the roof will perform better still.

So that is my description of the first method of getting online through public WiFi hotspots. The basic rules are that you have to find one, know the password, and be close enough to it for it to work. Plus you have no control over how fast or reliable it is - you have to make do with what you are given. If you are too far away, you can use an extender/repeater, but this will only increase the distance at which you can access, it won't improve the quality.

Access via the mobile phone network

The second method for accessing the internet from a vehicle or while you are out and about is through the mobile networks. As well as enabling you to make calls and send SMS messages, modern smartphones can also access the internet as well. Today this is known as 3G, 4G and soon 5G will be along as well. As you would expect 5G is faster than 4G is faster than 3G. Before 3G there was 2G also known as GPRS, but this is now all but obsolete. Most people with either a contract or pay as you go - PAYG - will have a data allowance included. This is measured in gigabytes - Gb, and you will usually have a set monthly allowance of Gbs of data as part of your deal.

The main thing to remember about mobile data is that unlike home broadband which is usually unlimited data, with mobile data you have a set allowance and once you have used it, you either have to wait until your monthly allowance resets, or you have to pay for more. There are a also few mobile contracts that allow unlimited data, but not many. 

So if you have a smartphone like an Iphone or Android, you can access the internet via 3G or 4G on your phone very easily. You also know that your smartphone can access the internet via WiFi as well. The way you can tell the difference is by looking at the little symbols on the top of your phone display - it will either say 3G or 4G if you are connected to the mobile network, or it will display the little fan shaped icon if you are connected to a WiFi hotspot - the one at your home for example. Most people have their smartphones set so that they access the internet through WiFi if it is available, or if not the phone switches to 3G or 4G automatically.

Modern smartphones also have what is known as a personal hotspot feature. This allows the phone to receive internet over 3G and 4G and then rebroadcasts it via WiFi, using the tiny WiFi aerial built into the phone. Smartphones have 2 aerials - one for receiving and transmitting 3G and 4G, and another for receiving and transmitting Wifi. In effect, modern smartphones have a built-in router. 

So in a vehicle for example, if your phone has a decent 3G or 4G signal, you can use it to re-broadcast the internet it gets from 3G and 4G via WiFi so that your other devices can access the internet through your phone's hotspot service. These devices can be anything that has Wifi - tablets, laptops, smart TVs etc. and the internet data they consume will come out of the same data allowance you have on your phone. It is important to remember what is going on here - your devices connect to your phone using WiFi, and your phone connects to the internet over 3G/4G.

However you have the same constraints with the mobile networks that you have with public WiFi hotspots - if you are too far away from the nearest mobile cell tower - ie no signal - then you will have no access. So it follows from this that if you have a bigger aerial then you have a bigger chance of getting a signal - especially if you are out and about in rural areas. Modern mobile coverage is pretty good, but as we all know sometimes you get "no service".

So how do you get a bigger aerial? You achieve this by using an additional device that has the facility to use a much bigger aerial. This is called a mobile router. A mobile router is a small box that is basically a mobile phone, but can't make calls - it has no keyboard or speaker or microphone. But it takes a sim card that only handles 3G and 4G data - usually called a "data only sim". All the mobile networks offer data only sims, either on contract or PAYG. A mobile router takes a data only sim card, connects to 3G or 4G and then rebroadcasts it as a WiFi hotspot - just the same as using a personal hotspot on your phone, but because it has a bigger aerial it will still have a signal in a weak area when your phone has none. A mobile router will usually have a bigger aerial sticking out of the back of it, quite often more than one aerial - as many as three, depending on the model. In fact it looks very similar to a typical WiFi extender/repeater that I described before, so it is easy to confuse the two, but they are quite different, and this is what causes people confusion. A Wifi extender/repeater connects to an existing WiFi hotspot (say McDonalds) and repeats it. A mobile router connects to the mobile 3G 4G networks from Orange, Vodafone O2 etc and then repeats it locally as Wifi. So both devices offer WiFi to your devices, but they get at the internet by different methods. To put it another way, one is WiFi to WiFi, the other is 3G/4G to WiFi.

MiFi

So what is a MiFi? Some clever guy a few years ago came up with this term, but has caused endless confusion! A MiFi is a small mobile router like I have just described. It takes a data only sim, and rebroadcasts the internet locally via Wifi. The reason they are popular is because they are small and cheap and battery operated. They allow you to set up a personal hotspot just like a smartphone, but without having to tie up the phone itself. If you use a smartphone as a personal hotspot then quite often this can be inconvenient - if the phone rings it can slow down the data connection, or indeed if the owner of the phone wants to go somewhere and take the phone with them, then the hotspot goes with them, and anybody left behind no longer has internet. So MiFis were introduced to get round this and are popular with travellers. But MiFis still suffer from the same constraints as smartphones - they only have a tiny built in aerial which is nowhere near as good as a full sized aerial. However a small number of MiFis do have tiny aerial sockets to which you can connect external aerials and as a result these particular models, mainly from Huawei, are very popular for use in campervans and motorhomes.

So a MiFi is exactly the same as a mobile router - it is just another name for the same thing. However although they do the same thing, there are subtle differences. A MiFi is a small device that is usually battery powered and is charged up by USB whereas a mobile router is generally a bigger device that has bigger aerials and proper aerial sockets to which you can easily connect external aerials. A full sized mobile router will also be usually directly powered by 12v and have no battery. This is an advantage because MiFi devices that have an internal battery when plugged permanently into a USB power source are effectively "permanently on charge" and in hot weather they can get quite hot and the batteries can expand. So the best technical solution for a motorhome is generally to use a 12v mobile router that is designed for permanent connection to 12v.

A mobile router with either a big aerial plugged into the back of it and sited near a window, or with a roof mounted aerial connected to it via coax cable, will pull in a mobile signal at least 10 times better than a phone or MiFi aerial.

So which is best?

So which should you use - public Wifi or 3G/4G? It's horses for courses. If you only want to check email and browse the news and keep up with Facebook, and not being able to access the internet occasionally doesn't bother you, then public Wifi should do you OK. But if you need to have a fast reliable connection available all the time, for work perhaps, then 3G/4G is the way to go and if you tend to travel a lot to out of the way places where mobile phone signals may well be weak then a mobile router with a big aerial will give you the maximum chance of getting online. The only time you will not be online is if you are in a location that has no mobile signal, no matter how big your aerial is. I have been travelling in a van for a very long time and nowadays I find it a very rare occurrence that I have no mobile signal with an external aerial, but it does occasionally happen.

Personally, I very rarely use public WiFi - for me it is just too unreliable, but I am online constantly and demand a lot from my connection. However I do possess an WiFi extender/repeater for occasional use. I have found campsite WiFi to be either expensive or slow, but occasionally I find that in the off season there are not many vans on site and the WiFi is fast - and if I am a bit too far away from the reception office where the router is, then that's when I get out my extender. It is also useful when I am parked outside friend's houses and their home WiFi isn't quite strong enough to penetrate inside the van. But mainly I am on 3G/4G home and abroad. I have a professional quality mobile router and a MIMO dome aerial on the van roof. This provides data to 2 phones, 2 tablets, the satnav, the smart TV and the laptop. I have a UK contract data sim which roams, and in addition while abroad I buy local PAYG data sims as needed. On average I probably pay about £50 a month for data. It sounds a lot but I regard it as an essential utility like electricity and water. I get electricity for free in the van, so it balances out.

Which data sim?

This is a complicated subject and the mobile networks are always coming up with new offers. The basic choice is contract or PAYG. You tend to get more Gb per pound on contract, but PAYG is of course better for occasional use. Then there is the matter of roaming abroad, which is a complex subject in itself, especially with Brexit looming at the time of writing.

Generally speaking, in 2019, and having travelled in many countries, the price of data has come down a lot in the last few years. In most countries now you can buy data for around 50p per Gb or less. How much data you need is entirely up to you. The biggest consumer of data is video - Netflix, Iplayer etc. Most people who have unlimited broadband at home and are used to watching video on demand as much as they want can get a shock when they try to do the same thing on the road via the mobile networks. So you have to shop around. As a general rule of thumb 1Gb will give you about 2 hours of online (not HD) TV. At the time of writing the Three network offers a "Go Binge" option which allows you unlimited video from Netflix or Iplayer and a few others, and is popular. They are also still offering, at the time of writing, an unlimited data package, they are the only UK network to do so to my knowledge. (Go Binge is limited to 10Gb when roaming)

The best approach is to buy a few PAYG sims and see how you go. Once you know what your average usage is you can then start to shop around for a good deal. Right now in March 2019 I am reading that Vodafone have a new deal offering 200Gb a month for £20 on a 12 month contract, and that it will work while roaming. I will believe it when I see it (the roaming!), but it is a sign of the way the market is going. When 5G comes out it is going to be fantastic for watching video - I can see a situation where mobile satellite TV systems costing several thousand pounds become obsolete when you can get HD video over 5G very cheaply. We can but dream.

What is a VPN?

It gets a bit complicated, but in simple terms a VPN is a service that prevents people from knowing which country you are in. Many people know that BBC Iplayer won't work when you are roaming abroad. To get round this you can use a VPN service. It costs a few pounds a month. However if you are using a UK sim, roaming in the EU, then you may find that Iplayer works without a VPN, so it pays to check first.

I hope this helps - please ask questions in the comments below and if you like my blog, please subscribe.