eSIM and SIM cards in El Salvador

The local SIM

• Tigo, Claro, Movistar and Digicel all operate, and prepaid data is cheap.
• El Salvador is small and densely populated, so coverage is good almost everywhere you would go - San Salvador, the surf coast at El Tunco and El Zonte, the Ruta de las Flores, Suchitoto.
• Registration needs the passport.

An eSIM instead

• Have data before you leave the airport. The FCDO tells you to pre-book taxis rather than take an unofficial one, and that needs a connection.
• The airport is 50 km from San Salvador, so this is not a problem you can walk away from.

Wi-fi

• San Salvador, the surf towns and the tourist route all have it, and the surf coast in particular has a remote-work crowd and internet to match.
• El Zonte is where the Bitcoin experiment started and still has more connected cafes than a village of its size would otherwise.