Colombia

About connectivity in Colombia

Colombia uses 110V/60Hz with Type A and Type B outlets — the North American standard. The phone jack is RJ-11. The Colombian telecom landscape historically had unusually strong municipal-utility operators — ETB (Empresa de Teléfonos de Bogotá) and EPM Telecomunicaciones (Empresas Públicas de Medellín) competed alongside the national Telecom Colombia, which was eventually sold to Telefónica and became Movistar Colombia. Claro (América Móvil), Movistar, Tigo (Millicom), and ETB compete in mobile and broadband today.

Colombia's academic UniRed opened the country's first international Internet connection in 1994. Commercial dial-up emerged through the mid-1990s with Telecom Colombia's service, ETB's consumer ISP, EPM's Internet operations, and a long list of regional providers. Per-minute metered access through Telecom Colombia / municipal PSTN networks dominated the late 1990s. ADSL rollout from the major operators began in 2001-2002, with cable broadband from Telmex Colombia (later Claro) and ETB competing across the 2000s. The Colombian broadband market matured through the 2010s with FTTH expansion in Bogotá, Medellín, Cali, Barranquilla, and Cartagena.

Telecom Colombia, ETB, and EPM each issued cardphone units in their respective regional markets from the mid-1990s onward, with chip-card cardphones becoming standard. The Colombian prepaid international calling-card market through the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s served the substantial outbound Colombian diaspora — an estimated 4-5 million Colombians live abroad, concentrated in the United States (the New York Metropolitan Area, Miami, and Houston), Spain (Madrid and Barcelona host the largest Colombian community in Europe), Venezuela (historically, before the post-2015 reverse migration), Ecuador, Chile, Panama, and Canada. Card brands targeting Colombia-specific destinations sold through Latin American grocery and convenience-store networks in receiving countries. Cardphone fleets across Colombian cities have been progressively decommissioned through the 2010s.

Tempest Telecom served Colombia through dial-up POPs in Bogotá, Medellín, Cali, and Barranquilla. Iridium satphones served the energy-sector customer base in the Llanos oil fields, the agricultural sector in the coffee region, NGO operators across the Pacific and Amazonian regions, and expedition crews supporting the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta and broader Andean operations. The country's historic security challenges through the 1990s and 2000s sustained a meaningful Tempest customer base among media, broadcast, and corporate-logistics operators.

Modern Colombia has expanding FTTH in major cities, with 4G LTE essentially universal in populated areas and 5G rollout active in Bogotá, Medellín, and Cali.

Tempest's services across Colombia, 1997–2012

Tempest Telecommunications operated international connectivity services in Colombia between 1997 and 2012 under a unified prepaid account that absorbed multiple service types onto a single customer credential. Customers in Colombia drew from the same balance for pre-paid international voice calling, RADIUS-authenticated dial-up Internet roaming, metered Wi-Fi hotspot access, Iridium satellite voice, and Inmarsat BGAN data terminals. An attempted kiosk-payment federation (PATN, 1998) extended the same architecture to public Internet terminals but failed to reach scale.

Iridium satellite voice was available in Colombia from approximately 2001 (post-bankruptcy relaunch). Thuraya coverage did not extend to Colombia; Inmarsat BGAN data terminals filled the broadband gap from late 2005.

Nearby countries in Americas

Brazil · Canada · Cayman Islands · Chile · Costa Rica · Cuba · Dominica · Dominican Republic

Browse all 229 countries →