Mobile Networks in Ireland

Ireland has three mobile networks: Vodafone, Three and eir. Every other brand you can buy a SIM from rents space on one of the three, and which one it rents from has less to do with your APN than you'd think.

Vodafone Ireland grew out of Eircell, the old state phone company's mobile arm. Three Ireland took over O2 Ireland in 2015. eir runs the network that started life as Meteor. Those three are the MNOs, the companies with their own masts. Everyone else is an MVNO. Clear Mobile, Sky Mobile Ireland and An Post Mobile run on Vodafone. 48, Tesco Mobile Ireland and Virgin Media run on Three. GoMo, Lidl Connect Ireland and Lycamobile Ireland run on eir.

Same masts, different APN

An Irish MVNO almost never uses its host network's APN. 48 and Tesco Mobile run on Three but need APNs ending in liffeytelecom.com, not 3ireland.ie. An Post Mobile runs on Vodafone but needs isp.postfone.ie. Lidl Connect runs on eir but needs truphone.com, because its SIMs come from 1GLOBAL. GoMo is the exception. It's eir's own brand and uses eir's APN. Typing the host's APN into a budget SIM is the most common way to end up with full signal bars and no data after a switch.

So match the APN to the name on your SIM, not to the network it runs on. Each network page below lists the exact values, with the MMSC and proxy for picture messages where the network publishes them.

Two kinds of Three SIM

Three still has two sets of settings in use. Its own SIMs carry the network code 272 05 and use 3ireland.ie. SIMs inherited from O2 Ireland, with numbers starting 8935302, carry 272 02 and use the APN internet. If a Three phone has the right-looking values and still won't connect, check the number printed on the SIM.

Lidl Connect, the newest one

Lidl Connect went on sale on 5 October 2026, sold only through the Lidl Plus app. Lidl doesn't publish an APN. The value that works, truphone.com, comes from 1GLOBAL, the company behind the SIM. Some phones also show an R for roaming at home and hold back data until Data Roaming is switched on. The Lidl Connect Ireland APN page covers both. If you landed on a German Lidl Connect guide, its web.vodafone.de APN won't work here.

eSIM and keeping your number

Apple lists Vodafone, Three, eir and Sky among the Irish networks that support eSIM on iPhone, and GoMo, Lidl Connect and Lycamobile sell eSIMs too. 48, Clear Mobile, Tesco Mobile and Virgin Media are still physical SIM only. An eSIM line gets its settings during activation, so the APN rarely needs typing on one.

You can take your number with you to any network. Full mobile number portability has run in Ireland since 2003, which also means a number's prefix no longer tells you which network it's on.

When data stops after a SIM swap, a reset or a new phone, the APN is the first thing to check. Find your network above and copy its values exactly.