Before you start

Passport or national ID for the mandatory identity verification
A German address, for postpaid contracts and broadband
A German bank account, for direct debit on a contract
An unlocked handset or one supporting eSIM

Step-by-step

1
Buy prepaid on day one and complete the identity check
Prepaid SIMs and eSIMs are sold in supermarkets, phone shops and online. Activation requires verification against a passport or ID — in store, by video call, or through the Post's service. It is quick and it is legally unavoidable.
In personWho: YouWeek 1
2
Leave the postpaid contract until you have some history
A Vertrag requires a German bank account, a registered address and a Schufa check. A brand-new file produces a refusal or a deposit demand. Prepaid avoids all three and modern allowances are perfectly adequate.
OnlineWho: You
3
Order broadband the day you sign the lease
German provisioning routinely takes three to six weeks and can require an engineer plus cabling work in a shared stairwell — which in a listed or semi-renovated Gründerzeit building can add weeks more. Place the order against the future address with a start date.
OnlineWho: YouAt lease signing
4
Ask what is physically installed in the building, not the postcode
Leipzig has invested heavily in fibre, but coverage inside older blocks depends on whether the building was renovated and when. Two neighbouring houses in Plagwitz can be a decade apart. Ask the landlord or the outgoing tenant which technology terminates in the flat, at the viewing.
OnlineWho: You
5
Check coverage on the routes you will actually travel
The city itself is well covered. Regional lines out into rural Saxony and toward the Thuringian border still drop calls in a way that surprises people arriving from denser countries. Compare the three operators on the regulator's map for your specific commute if you work while travelling.
OnlineWho: You
6
Read the cancellation terms before you sign
German contracts historically rolled over for a full further year if you missed the cancellation window. Since the Telekommunikationsgesetz was overhauled on 1 December 2021 a contract continuing past its minimum term can be cancelled with one month's notice — but older contracts and older advice still reflect the previous regime.
OnlineWho: You

Documents you’ll need

Passport or national ID for SIM registration
Meldebescheinigung, for postpaid contracts
German bank details for direct debit
Rental contract, to order broadband against a future address

Things most newcomers don’t know

In Leipzig's Gründerzeit stock, what is in the building matters far more than what is in the postcode.

The city's housing is overwhelmingly late-nineteenth-century, and connectivity tracks the renovation history rather than the location: a fully modernised block may have fibre to the flat while the identical house next door still runs copper from a cellar junction that was last touched in the 1990s. Availability checkers report what is sellable to the address, not what terminates in your rooms. Ask at the viewing.

Source: Breitbandatlas (Gigabitgrundbuch des Bundes)

Order broadband at lease signing — the gap is weeks, not days.

German fixed-line provisioning is slow by the standards of almost any comparable country, routinely three to six weeks and considerably longer where an engineer must run cable through a shared stairwell in an old building. The order can be placed against a future address at no cost. Waiting for the keys means a month of tethering, and for anyone working remotely that is real money.

Source: community-reported

There is no anonymous prepaid SIM, and automated verification rejects some passports.

Since a 2017 change to the Telekommunikationsgesetz every SIM must be registered against a verified identity document before it activates. Video identification supports only certain nationalities and people are bounced mid-call regularly. The post office route accepts any valid passport and is the reliable fallback — worth knowing before you build a day around a SIM that will not switch on.

Source: Bundesnetzagentur

Coverage falls away fast once you leave the city into rural Saxony.

Leipzig itself is well served, but the regional rail lines toward the Thuringian border and the villages in between still have real gaps, and this is one of the areas where Germany's mobile network genuinely underperforms its reputation. If you commute by regional train or spend weekends outside the city, choose an operator on the regulator's coverage map for that route rather than on the headline price.

Source: Bundesnetzagentur — mobile coverage map

Common mistakes to avoid

Ordering broadband on moving day rather than at lease signing.
Trusting a postcode availability checker for a nineteenth-century building.
Expecting to buy an unregistered prepaid SIM off a shelf.
Applying for a postpaid contract in your first weeks with no Schufa record.
Choosing a network on price when your weekends are spent on regional lines out of the city.

Some of this may be out of date. Spotted something inaccurate? Help us keep it right for the next newcomer.