Navigator App on board question

[sdjen]

I am not a tech person so sorry if this is a dumb question!

We have family traveling with us on our upcoming cruise and their kids don't have cell phones. I happen to have a couple of old I phones that still work (but not for calling or texting - no phone service). Since the Navigator app uses the ship WIFI, do you think they would work for texting through the app? I would let the kids have one if they could communicate with us when needed.

Thanks!

 

[FigmentSpark]

My DS used his ipod... no cell service, just wifi. I used it on my ipad, as well as my phone.

 

[ImDMous]

As long as the phones meet the minimum requirements for the app, they should work fine. Mainly depends on what version of iOS they have.

Compatibility: Requires iOS 8.0 or later. Compatible with iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch.

 

[elvispursley]

Beats using a wave phone! Could never hear those things ring and trying to read the screen in the sun? Please! Hope the old phones work out for you!

 

[apathetic]

As long as you can run the app you are ok. You can even use an ipad (without cell service). It runs off the ship's wifi, cell service has no impact.

 

[Anchors Away 2016]

Before you board, the App is only a countdown timer, but I believe it won't even run on the device if it isn't compatible. So you should be able to try to download the app on those old phones, via your home wifi, and then start them and see if the countdown timers work. This should give you some confidence that they will work on board too, once the other features are enabled. Have a great time. We loved keeping in touch with our whole group using the App.

 

[cmph]

That's exactly what we did, actually, and it worked great! We used an old Samsung, wiped it of personal info on the off chance it got lost, and installed the app while at home. Actually, EVERYone should do that - install it at home. My mom hadn't, so I was doing that for her while we were embarking and then at lunch, and it was a real pain doing that in the midst of everything. Otherwise we could have sat there at lunch and just connected ourselves for messaging, but instead I was fussing with installation on her somewhat old iphone. Anyway, the old phone worked great for DS. I also put a few game apps on there as well, for him to play while he was waiting in the theater for a show to start, which made it even more useful. I've already told my sister to save any phones they retire for this exact reason.

 

[JWG]

Our DD used her iPod with no issue aboard the Fantasy (once the App was "activated" so to speak). It felt like it didn't recognize us as passengers until we actually left the terminal. Maybe it has something to do when they turn the manifest over or something? The first few hours on board it switched from the countdown to recognizing we were on the ships Wifi, but some of the functionality (inviting others to be friends, etc.) didn't work until we left dock.