You can get by without cell phone service in the USA. On all my business trips back to the USA while living in China, I didn't have much a problem (free open wifi is pretty common, you can even use Uber pretty easily without a phone number).

In China...if someone else can get you a SIM, you'll be OK, or maybe you can get one at the airport in customs (that used to be possible), though they have been cracking down on SIMs without ID numbers or resident visas associated with them.

> they have been cracking down on SIMs without ID numbers or resident visas associated with them.

?? I use Google Fi which has agreements with providers in almost every country, I had data as soon as I walked off the plane in China. Alipay was almost as easy to set up, although I understand that until recently it was limited to those with a Chinese bank account.

> I use Google Fi which gives has agreements with providers in almost every country, I had data as soon as I walked off the plane in China

That sounds really nice...and a bit surprising considering nothing else Google works in China without a VPN.

So...does it also work as a normal phone with a Chinese number so you can logon to wifi at Starbucks in China?

> a bit surprising considering nothing else Google works in China without a VPN.

It is a bit surprising, although Google does have offices in China. It also has a VPN built in, which I recall would intermittently bypass the GFW.

> So...does it also work as a normal phone with a Chinese number so you can logon to wifi at Starbucks in China?

No, I don't think so, but I had unlimited data.

Were you in Guangzhou by any chance? They weird connections for foreigners that bypass the firewall, things that don’t exist in Beijing or Shanghai.

No, I was in Beijing, Kunming, and Shanghai. But I honestly don't recall the specifics of the firewall bypass - I was using Outline (another Google sponsored project, funnily enough) to skip it most of the time anyways.