Siima vs Saily 2026
Saily comes from Nord Security, the company behind NordVPN, and it shows — the eSIM plan comes wrapped in an app with a built-in ad blocker and an optional phone-number add-on. Siima strips the opposite direction: a browser checkout with nothing to download and nothing bundled in. Which one you want depends on whether you'd rather have an app ecosystem or a five-minute purchase.
A VPN company's eSIM vs a checkout-first eSIM
Saily launched out of Nord Security — the team behind NordVPN, NordPass, and NordLocker — and it inherited that team's instinct to build a full app rather than a simple storefront. Inside the Saily app you'll find local, regional, and global plan tiers (global coverage runs to 121+ destinations), a built-in ad blocker and web-protection layer, and an optional US phone number for calls and texts. It's less a data purchase and more a small product suite.
Siima only does one thing: sell you the eSIM. There's no app to open later, no ad blocker running in the background, no phone-number upsell. You land on a country page, pick a data size, and pay — the whole flow is designed to be forgotten the moment the QR code lands in your inbox.
| What you're comparing | Siima | Saily |
|---|---|---|
| Buying the eSIM | Browser, no download | App Store / Play Store download |
| Getting past checkout | Email address only | Google or Apple sign-in required |
| Seeing the real cost | Plan + service fee + processing fee shown separately | One bundled price per GB tier |
| Anything beyond data | Nothing — data only | Ad blocker built in, US number add-on available |
The sign-in you didn't expect
Saily doesn't make you register a new password-and-email account the way some competitors do — credit where it's due, that's a reasonable design choice. But it still gates the app behind Google or Apple authentication, so there's no way to buy a plan as a true one-off guest. If you're setting up an eSIM for a parent who doesn't have (or doesn't want to hand over) a Google or Apple login on that phone, it becomes a real obstacle rather than a minor speed bump.
Siima never asks. Checkout takes an email address, and that's the only identifier tied to the purchase — useful if you're buying for someone else, buying from a shared or work device, or just don't want another app carrying a login token on your phone.
Bundled price vs itemized price
Saily's plan tiers are priced as single numbers — a Japan 10GB/30-day plan or a Global 20GB/365-day plan each show one figure in the app, take it or leave it. That's fine as far as it goes, but it also means the plan cost, any service margin, and payment processing are folded together where you can't see the split.
Siima breaks the same purchase into its parts at checkout: the data plan itself, a service fee, and a processing fee, each shown as its own line before you confirm. It's a small thing until you're comparing two providers and trying to work out what you're actually paying for beyond the gigabytes.
Buying through an AI assistant
Siima runs a public MCP server at api.siima.online/mcp, so an AI assistant like Claude or ChatGPT can search plans and hand you a checkout link without you opening an app or a browser tab yourself. Saily's flow is built around its own app UI end to end, with sign-in as the first step — there's no path for an agent to complete a purchase on your behalf.
Where Saily still has the edge
If you already trust Nord Security's other products, Saily's app-based model buys you things Siima doesn't try to offer: a persistent US phone number for about a dollar a month if you need to receive calls or texts while abroad, a built-in ad blocker running across your browsing, and one dashboard listing every plan you've ever bought across 121+ destinations. For someone who wants a single travel-tech app rather than a one-time purchase, that's a real advantage — you're paying for it with the download, the sign-in, and a bundled price you can't break down.