A Ghanaian phone number is the first thing to sort out. Mobile money, bank verification, ride-hailing, delivery, and every office that will call you back all depend on it.
The networks
| Network | Notes |
|---|---|
| MTN | Largest, best coverage nationally, and the default for MoMo. If you carry one SIM, carry this one. |
| Telecel | Formerly Vodafone Ghana. Good in Accra, competitive data, strong fixed broadband. |
| AT | Formerly AirtelTigo. Often the cheapest data bundles. |
Many people in Accra carry two SIMs — MTN because everyone accepts MTN MoMo, and a second network for cheaper data or as a hedge when one has a bad day.
SIM registration
SIM registration is tied to the Ghana Card and it is enforced. An unregistered SIM gets deactivated.
What you need:
- Your Ghana Card, or the non-citizen Ghana Card if you are a foreign resident
- Your fingerprint, captured at the point of registration
Where: any network shop or an accredited agent.
You may register up to 10 SIM cards in total against one Ghana Card, across all networks combined.
Do not buy a pre-registered SIM
Someone will offer you one, usually at a station or a market. It is registered to a stranger, which means they can reclaim it, you cannot recover it if lost, and any fraud committed on it points at them and then at you. Register your own.
If you have just arrived and do not yet have a Ghana Card, networks generally allow registration against a passport for visitors, with tighter limits. Ask at a main branch rather than a roadside agent, and expect to re-register once your card arrives.
Data
Ghanaian mobile data is bought in bundles rather than on an open tariff. Bundles are sold by size and by validity — daily, weekly, monthly — and there are usually cheaper night bundles and social-media-only bundles.
Buy bundles through:
- The network’s USSD code, which works on any phone
- The network app
- MoMo, which is the easiest route once your wallet is running
A monthly bundle sufficient for ordinary use runs in the low hundreds of cedis. Data is not cheap relative to incomes, which is why so much of the Ghanaian web is built to be light — and why this site inlines its stylesheet rather than making you download one.
Tips:
- Check validity, not just size. A large bundle that expires in 24 hours is not a bargain.
- Turn off auto-updates on your phone over mobile data. App updates will eat a bundle overnight.
- Night bundles are dramatically cheaper if your usage can wait.
Home internet
Fibre — MTN and Telecel both sell fibre-to-the-home in Accra. Where it is available it is the best option by a wide margin: fast, uncapped or generously capped, and stable. Availability is street by street, so ask neighbours what they actually have rather than trusting a coverage map.
Fixed wireless — a router with a SIM in it, sold by all three networks. Widely available, quick to set up, and adequate for a household that is not streaming constantly.
Busy and other ISPs offer fixed wireless in parts of the city.
Starlink operates in Ghana. Expensive relative to local options, and genuinely useful where fibre does not reach or reliability matters more than cost.
Plan for outages
Home internet depends on mains power. When dumsor takes your street out, your router goes with it. A small UPS for the router and a charged phone with a mobile bundle is the standard defence. — Electricity and dumsor
Calling
Ghana’s country code is +233. Local numbers are ten digits beginning with 0; drop the leading 0 when dialling internationally.
Calling between networks costs more than calling within one, which is another reason people carry two SIMs.
WhatsApp is the default for both messaging and calls, to the point where a business will often give you a WhatsApp number rather than an email address.