How do I get my phone ready to go on holiday?

With the spring weather fast approaching, it’s the perfect time of year to jet off and get away from it all. But before you leave for the airport, make sure your phone is ready for the journey ahead!

Here are some top tips to make sure you’re not caught out on your break abroad.

The batteries inside our phones are typically designed to last for around a day of moderate usage. But when you’re away from home, you’re probably using it so much more, whether you’re posting videos from the beach to family stuck back in grey old Britain, or keeping up on your work emails, because you can’t simply tear yourself away.

So you’re going to want some extra support so you don’t end up going AWOL when your phone dies.

That’s why I recommend picking up a USB power bank, which is a portable extra battery that you can plug your phone into wherever you happen to be—and it’ll give you that little bit of extra juice to keep you connected to the rest of the world.

There’s no particular brand I’d recommend, as there are so many—but for around £30 you can pick up a high-capacity battery that can keep you going for days.

What good is a phone if you can’t connect it to the internet? The good news is that it is easier than ever to stay connected when abroad.

Make sure you check with your network provider what your roaming plan is. If you have a contract, it is likely that European roaming is part of your bundle, meaning you should be able to watch YouTube and post to Facebook just like when you’re at home.

But if you’re on Pay As You Go or are heading further afield, you may want to check the exact terms so you don’t either end up disconnected, or with a hefty bill when you get home (Scottish government minister Michael Matheson learned this the hard way last year, racking up an £11,000 roaming bill after a trip to Morocco).

And don’t worry if you can’t roam, or if it’s eye-wateringly expensive. In many countries it is straightforward to buy a SIM card for a local network, with a much more generous data allowance.

In fact, you may not even need a physical SIM card anymore. If you’ve got a newer phone, it will probably support “eSIM”—where you can simply use an app like Holafly or Airalo while connected to wifi to set yourself up on a new network temporarily, so you can be ready to roam before you even leave the airport.

And finally, you need to get your apps in order. If you’ve got a boarding pass or a train ticket, then the chances are that if you look at your confirmation email, there will be a link to add your ticket to your phone’s wallet app.

This means that you can do away with paper when you reach the departure lounge, and simply wave your phone at the scanner instead (just don’t forget your passport which, sadly, still needs to be made from paper).

Once you arrive you’ll need a mapping app, and maybe even a translation app—Apple and Google make their own version of both. And modern translation apps are particularly exciting, as you can typically just wave the camera of your phone over pretty much anything, and get a clear translation.

The real pro-tip though is to dive into both apps and make sure that all of the critical data is downloaded so that they work offline. That way, even if you can’t get a phone signal, you can still use the app to find your hotel or translate the menu.

And this is easy to do. On Google Maps, before you leave simply hit the icon showing your profile photo and go to “Offline Maps” and choose “Select your own map”—then all you have to do is drag the circle to your destination, and the app will download all of the streets and many of the points of interest, so you’ll have them in your pocket wherever you are.

And similarly, on both Apple and Google’s Translate apps, if you go to settings and choose “Download language”, you’ll be given a list to choose from—just pick the language you want and wait a few minutes, and it’ll store everything the phone needs to translate right there on the phone, so you can travel the world like a local. Bon voyage!