Congo
Power & telecom standards in Congo
Connectivity Overview
Tempest Telecom offered dial-up internet access, WiFi hotspot access and broadband ethernet access in Congo. We also offered Iridium satellite Internet and Voice access in Congo for communications in rural areas without infrastructure.
Congo uses 230V at 50Hz. Power outlets are type C, E and telephone jacks are RJ-11.
Dial-up Internet Access
Tempest Telecom provided local dial-up access numbers in Congo at $0.255/minute. Travelers could connect using any standard modem with an RJ-11 telephone adapter.
WiFi Hotspot Access
Tempest Telecom provided WiFi hotspot access in Congo at $19.95/day for unlimited browsing.
Adapters & Power
Travelers from North America will need a power plug adapter. European Type C/F adapters are widely compatible.
Standard RJ-11 jacks are used. Most international modems will connect without an adapter.
Congo at a Glance
- Capital
- Brazzaville
- Phone Code
- +242
- Voltage
- 230V / 50Hz
- Power Plug
- C, E
- Phone Jack
- RJ-11
- Currency
- CFA Franc
- Dial-up
- $0.255/min
- WiFi
- $19.95/day
About connectivity in Congo
The Republic of the Congo (Congo-Brazzaville) uses 230V/50Hz with Type C and Type E outlets — French colonial-era wiring. The phone jack is RJ-11. Congo Telecom holds substantial fixed-line market position; Airtel Congo and MTN Congo compete in mobile. The country is distinct from its larger neighbor the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Congo-Kinshasa).
Congolese commercial Internet emerged in the late 1990s. Per-minute metered dial-up dominated. Mobile data has driven most subsequent connectivity growth. The 2009 arrival of the WACS underwater cable expanded international bandwidth.
The Congolese prepaid international calling-card market through the 2000s served the modest Congolese diaspora — concentrated in France (Paris-Château-Rouge area), Belgium, and across the Central African Community labor circuit.
Tempest Telecom served the Republic of Congo through dial-up POPs in Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire. The substantial offshore oil-and-gas sector (the Pointe-Noire field operations) was a meaningful Iridium customer base.
Modern Congo-Brazzaville has expanding 4G LTE coverage in Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire.
Tempest's services across Congo, 1997–2012
Tempest Telecommunications operated international connectivity services in Congo between 1997 and 2012 under a unified prepaid account that absorbed multiple service types onto a single customer credential. Customers in Congo drew from the same balance for pre-paid international voice calling, RADIUS-authenticated dial-up Internet roaming, metered Wi-Fi hotspot access, Iridium and Thuraya satellite voice, and Inmarsat BGAN and Thuraya data terminals. An attempted kiosk-payment federation (PATN, 1998) extended the same architecture to public Internet terminals but failed to reach scale.
Both Iridium (global LEO) and Thuraya (regional GEO) satellite voice were available in Congo from approximately 2001, alongside global BGAN data from late 2005.
Nearby countries in Africa
Cape Verde · Central African Republic · Chad · Comoros · Congo. Democratic Republic of the · Djibouti · Egypt · Equatorial Guinea