If Bulgaria is your whole trip and you are staying more than about three weeks, walk into a Yettel or Vivacom shop with your passport and stop comparing. Bulgarian prepaid pricing survived the euro changeover almost untouched, which means fifteen gigabytes and a thousand minutes for under eight euro, or twenty-five gigabytes for a little over ten. Nothing in the international eSIM market gets close on volume. The parts most guides skip are the ones that decide whether that is the right buy for you: prepaid lines here are registered against your passport, the three networks are genuinely different animals rather than clones, and the shop that is open when you land depends on which of Sofia Airport's two distant terminals you arrive at. Below is what each operator charges in the new currency, what the counter will ask for, and where a travel eSIM is still the better call.
What This Guide Covers
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Three Operators, No Obvious Winner
Bulgaria has an unusually balanced mobile market. A1 Bulgaria leads with roughly 2.9 million lines and about 36 percent of subscribers, Vivacom follows with around 2.6 million and 32 percent, and Yettel holds about 2.3 million and 31 percent. Revenues line up in the same order, a little over one billion euro for A1 in 2025 against 776 million for Vivacom and 556 million for Yettel, out of a total telecoms market of 2.16 billion euro that grew close to five percent over the year.
What makes the choice interesting is that the independent measurements refuse to crown anybody. The January 2026 assessment gave Vivacom the coverage and 5G coverage titles, Yettel 5G availability, reliability and time on network, and A1 consistent quality. On pure speed A1 walks it, with 5G downloads around 466 Mbit/s and an all-technology average near 114 Mbit/s against roughly 96 for Vivacom and 90 for Yettel. Three operators, four different definitions of good, and a visitor who only needs one of them.
Every price on this page is a euro price now
Bulgaria entered the euro area on 1 January 2026 at a locked rate of 1.95583 lev to the euro, and the euro became sole legal tender a month later. The requirement to print both currencies on price tags ran until 8 August 2026 and has now lapsed, so tariff cards in carrier shops, top-up terminals and vending machines show euro alone. Any Bulgarian data package you see quoted in lev in an older article converts at roughly half: 10 lev is 5.11 euro, 15 lev is 7.67, 20 lev is 10.23. Operators re-denominated rather than rounded up, so the underlying deals survived the switch broadly intact.
A1 Bulgaria (formerly Mobiltel)
A1 is the biggest network in the country and the one that behaves most like a premium operator. Its 4G reaches beyond 99.4 percent of the population, it was first to run nationwide 5G, and it holds the fastest measured 5G in Bulgaria by a wide margin. If you are staying in Sofia, Plovdiv or Varna and you care about how quickly a large file moves, this is the one to be on. It is also the network Airalo puts its Bulgaria eSIM on, sold under the Bultel label.
A1 runs the most visible retail estate too, with shops in every mall and a presence in both Sofia Airport terminals. Its tourist-facing packages sit at the upper end of Bulgarian pricing without ever becoming expensive by European standards: expect something in the region of 10 euro for 10 GB over ten to fourteen days, and around 13 to 14 euro for a 20 GB pack with a slightly longer window. Standalone data add-ons for an existing prepaid line run about 3 euro for 1 GB, 5 euro for 2.5 GB and 15 euro for 9 GB.
When A1 is worth the extra euro or two
Two cases. The first is remote work, because A1's consistent-quality win in the January 2026 round means fewer of those moments where a call holds but nothing actually moves. The second is a trip built around the big cities, where A1's 5G speed advantage is real rather than theoretical. If your Bulgaria is a mountain village, a Rhodope valley or a long drive on secondary roads, that advantage buys you nothing and Vivacom's coverage record is the better bet.
Yettel Bulgaria (formerly Telenor)
Yettel is the smallest of the three and the best value, which is a combination that usually means compromise. Here it does not. In the January 2026 measurement round Yettel was the only Bulgarian operator to take three separate categories, winning 5G availability, reliability experience and time on network. Those are the metrics that describe how often you are on a modern network and how often ordinary things simply work, as opposed to how fast a speed test reads once you have found a good spot.
Its prepaid packs are priced accordingly. Recent tourist bundles have included 6 GB with 400 minutes over fourteen days for about 4.09 euro, 8 GB with 500 minutes over thirty days for around 5.11, and 15 GB with 1,000 minutes for roughly 7.67. Those are not typos. Fifteen gigabytes and a thousand minutes for less than eight euro is the sort of pricing that makes visitors from Western Europe ask the assistant to repeat it.
Yettel keeps a 24-hour shop at Sofia Airport Terminal 1, which is worth knowing if you land on a budget carrier at an awkward hour. It is also the network underneath Nomad's Bulgaria eSIM, so a Nomad plan and a Yettel prepaid card are riding the same masts at very different prices per gigabyte.
Vivacom
Vivacom is the former state incumbent, now part of United Group, and it is the network to choose if your itinerary leaves the motorways. It held both the coverage experience and the 5G coverage experience awards in January 2026, its 4G reaches around 99 percent of the population and its 5G is reported to pass roughly 92 percent, a figure that puts Bulgaria among the stronger performers in the European Union on 5G reach rather than merely on 5G marketing.
Prepaid pricing is competitive with Yettel and slightly under A1. Representative packs have included 12 GB with 800 minutes over thirty days at about 6.14 euro and 25 GB of high-speed data over thirty days at around 10.23. Vivacom also markets a Data2go style product around the 10 euro mark aimed at travellers who want a chunk of allowance usable across the EU rather than only inside Bulgaria, which is the one Bulgarian prepaid product worth a look if you are continuing to Greece, Romania or Serbia.
Where Vivacom's coverage lead actually shows
Not in Sofia, where all three networks are excellent, and not on the coast, where everyone has built out for the season. It shows in the Rhodopes south of Plovdiv, on the back roads between the Danube towns, and on the approaches to the Rila and Pirin trailheads, where one operator having a mast and the others not is the entire difference. If you are driving rural Bulgaria rather than riding the intercity buses, this is your network.
The Passport Step and the Ten-Card Limit
Bulgaria ties prepaid mobile numbers to an identity document, so buying a SIM here means handing over your passport at the counter. The assistant records your details, the line activates, and that is the end of it. Since 2016 there has also been a cap of ten SIM cards per person, with operators obliged to cut off anything beyond that, which no visitor is ever going to run into but explains why the process is documented at all.
What the assistant will ask you for
1. Present your passport. A national ID card works for EU citizens, but a driving licence will not.
2. Some shops also ask for an address, which can be your hotel. Have the booking confirmation on your phone if you want to save a conversation.
3. Choose a pack. Staff in Sofia, Plovdiv and the coastal resorts deal with foreign visitors constantly and will point you at the tourist bundles unprompted.
4. Pay in euro, by card or cash. Card is accepted everywhere and is simpler now that everything is quoted in one currency.
5. Test data before you walk away. Activation is usually immediate but it is a thirty-second check that saves a return trip.
Two practical consequences follow. One person cannot buy a handful of cards for a group, because each line registers to its own holder standing there with a document. And the registration is the single piece of friction that a travel eSIM removes outright, which matters more at eleven at night in a resort town than it does at eleven in the morning in a Sofia mall.
Bulgarian Prepaid Packs Side by Side, in Euro
| Operator | Representative pack | Price | Suits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Yettel | 15 GB + 1,000 min, 30 days | About 7.67 EUR | The best raw value in the country for a month |
| Yettel | 6 GB + 400 min, 14 days | About 4.09 EUR | A light fortnight in the cities |
| Vivacom | 25 GB, 30 days | About 10.23 EUR | Rural driving and heavy navigation use |
| Vivacom | 12 GB + 800 min, 30 days | About 6.14 EUR | A balanced month with calls included |
| A1 | 10 GB tourist pack, 10 to 14 days | Around 10 EUR | City trips where speed matters most |
| A1 | 20 GB pack, about 20 days | Around 13 to 14 EUR | Longer stays on the fastest network |
| Travel eSIM | 10 GB metered, or unlimited by day | Roughly 11 to 16 USD metered, from about 3.90 a day unlimited | Short trips, ski weeks, late arrivals, no passport step |
Read that table honestly and the local operators win the money argument by a factor of two or three. What they do not win is the first hour of the trip, the passport step, or the ability to keep working when you cross into Greece for a day. The Bulgaria eSIM guide lays out which travel provider sits on which of these three networks, because that pairing is what decides whether an eSIM feels like a Yettel line or an A1 one.
Buying and Topping Up Around the Country
Sofia Airport. Vivacom and Yettel both keep shops in Terminal 1 that are staffed around the clock, and A1 has counters in both terminals running roughly 06:00 to 22:00. That asymmetry catches people out, because most international arrivals land at Terminal 2 while two of the three 24-hour shops sit at Terminal 1, a free shuttle ride away. The Sofia Airport guide works through the terminal layout and the transport that connects them.
City shops. All three operators have branches on and around Vitosha Boulevard in Sofia, in Serdika Center, Paradise Center and The Mall, and in every regional city centre. Coastal resorts have carrier shops through the season, and Bansko has them year round. Staff in tourist areas will assume you want a data pack and will usually get you sorted in under ten minutes.
Supermarkets and kiosks. Starter packs turn up in larger supermarkets and at press kiosks, but the registration requirement means the actual activation still has to be done properly, so a carrier shop is the cleaner route for a visitor.
Topping up now that the lev is gone
Top-up terminals stand in shopping centres, metro station concourses and supermarket entrances across the country and all of them now take euro coins and notes. Card top-ups through each operator's app work fine on a foreign card. Old paper lev vouchers are historic curiosities rather than payment methods, and if you find yourself holding lev cash from a previous trip, the Bulgarian National Bank exchanges it for free with no limit and no deadline, while commercial banks are running the service until the end of 2026 with fees since July.
So Which Should You Actually Buy?
This site earns money when you buy an eSIM and is still going to say plainly that a month in Bulgaria on a local card costs less than a week on a travel plan. Below is an honest split of the cases where each option is the better buy.
Buy Bulgarian when
Buy an eSIM when
The middle path most repeat visitors settle into is to fly in on an eSIM and decide about a local card once the length of the stay is clear. Bulgarian prepaid is cheap enough that adding one later costs almost nothing, and running two lines on one handset removes the single point of failure on a trip where the nearest carrier shop might be an hour of switchbacks away. The Sofia city guide covers what happens to your signal underground once you are in the capital.
Frequently Asked Questions
Now that the lev has gone, are Bulgarian data packs still cheap?
Yes. Operators re-denominated their price lists rather than using the changeover as cover for an increase, so the deals crossed over broadly intact. Yettel has been selling 15 GB with 1,000 minutes for about 7.67 euro, Vivacom 25 GB for roughly 10.23 and A1 a 10 GB tourist pack near 10 euro. Those are among the lowest prices anywhere in the euro area. The only real change for a visitor is that you no longer have to convert anything in your head, since price tags have been euro-only since 9 August 2026.
Which operator should I walk into if I only have time for one shop?
Yettel, on value and on the measurements. It came out of the January 2026 national assessment with three category wins covering 5G availability, reliability and time on network, and its prepaid packs are the cheapest of the three. Go to Vivacom instead if you are heading into the Rhodopes or the Danube back roads, where its coverage record is the meaningful advantage, and to A1 if you are staying in the big cities and want the fastest 5G in the country.
What does the shop need from me before the number works?
Your passport, and occasionally an address that can simply be your hotel. Bulgaria requires prepaid lines to be registered to an identity document, so the assistant records the details before activation and there is no way to skip it. EU nationals can use a national ID card instead. Everyone in a group needs to be present for their own line, and there is a ten-card ceiling per person that exists for regulatory reasons and will never affect a traveller.
Can I keep using a Bulgarian prepaid card in Greece or Serbia?
Greece yes, Serbia no. Bulgaria is in the European Union, so roam-like-at-home applies to a Bulgarian prepaid line inside the bloc, subject to whatever fair-use allowance is attached to your specific pack, which on a very cheap bundle can be modest. Serbia, North Macedonia and Turkey sit outside that arrangement, and while regional roaming deals exist in the Western Balkans they do not extend an EU prepaid pack. A multi-country travel eSIM is the tidier answer for a Balkan loop.
Is topping up straightforward without speaking Bulgarian?
Very. Payment terminals stand in metro concourses, malls and supermarket entrances nationwide, all of them take euro cash now, and every one has an English option that walks you through choosing your operator and entering your number. Each carrier's app also takes a foreign card without fuss. Running low on data in Bulgaria is a five-minute detour rather than an actual problem, which is one reason a smaller starting pack is usually the smarter buy.