Not an American, but from my experience there’s no problem receiving SMS abroad.
When traveling abroad with no roaming plan, you can’t make it receive calls, and you can’t send text messages, but incoming text messages simply work, at no charge.
I never experienced significant delay also.
This of course requires keeping your home SIM card in your phone. That’s no problem of your phone supports dual DIM or eSIM. Of not, you may want to take an extra phone for the stole purpose of receiving SMS.
Of course, I can’t guarantee that it would work for you. Having a plan B is anyways good.
(Note: I’m an Indian, and my experience is with Indian and Japanese mobile providers [and to some extent travelling in the US], but I think this should work well enough in any combination of countries in which you can access the internet and Google services work fine.)
In the past, I have had some luck using the web interface of Google Messages (https://messages.google.com/web/) for accessing messages from an Indian SIM that I left behind on which I would get OTPs from Indian banks (none of the five banks I have had experience with support TOTP apps). To do this:
You need to authenticate the browser you’re using with the phone in advance.
The phone must be powered on and have internet connectivity.
The browser needs to be re-authenticated periodically (every two weeks, IIRC).
Provided you set it up in advance, this can work without the involvement of anybody else for up to two weeks. Any longer or if you are already travelling, you’ll need somebody’s help.
With iPhones, I think messages can synced with a Macbook or similar Apple devices over iCloud. That might be an option if you’re in the Apple ecosystem.
Not going to rehash what has already been said, but just a few specific points:
To address the suggestions from @BoppreH:
Note: many services look at the device fingerprint – if they notice a change, you may have to prove it’s you. So if you try to access your services from a "new" device – and what’s more, from abroad – expect additional verifications.
My answer sounds like a product pitch but it’s not intend as such other than "it actually works". I have no affiliation with or financial interest in T-Mobile.
We use a T-Mobile plan in the US which comes with free data and texting in 100+ countries and is competitively priced. No need for the ridiculous fees that Verzion, AT&T etc charge for international service (which is typically something crazy like $10/day).
We’ve used it in over 30 countries so far and never had an issue. It’s on the slow side, but coverage is good and it’s certainly fast enough for authorization, Google Maps, and WhatsApp.
The phone works immediately when you enter a new country. You don’t have to do anything and there is no need for a SIM card or a local phone number.
Newer phones have "Wifi calling". Like the name implies, it lets your phone operates normally using Wi-Fi instead of cellular connection. My phone, Samsung A13 5G has it. It also has dual SIM slots, so I can use both my US and local SIM.
I never had any issues with 2FA when I was in Asia for almost 2 months. But having 2 SIMs did confuse some of the apps I installed (they checked for local phone numbers). So, I needed to disable one of the SIMs. And many times, I forgot to re-enable it. Lol.
You have a few options, ordered from most desirable to least:
Relying on a friend’s availability is tricky, especially over large time zone differences. And be mindful of phishing attacks; make it explicit that you’ll call/message them each time you need a code, that they should only forward the messages to you, and to otherwise ignore any messages about that service.
And do a test run first, preferably still at home. If you can test with a VPN from the target country, even better. Security measures change depending on risk factors, and the service might be more stringent if it’s your first connection from that country.
You are right to be worried: text message (SMS) delivery is best effort only. When traveling internationally, they are all too frequently delivered late or never, and there is really no way around this because the protocol itself does not guarantee delivery.
The best option is to switch your second factor to an alternative method that does not rely on the phone network. Time-based One Time Passwords (TOTP) from free apps like Authy or Google Authenticator are common and supported by lots of popular apps like Gmail, Instagram/Facebook, PayPal, etc. Most banks also support alternatives to SMS, often through their own apps or sometimes via physical tokens, although these are a hassle and increasingly going away.
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