SkieDoes a hostel tablet need a SIM card for Skie to work?
No. Wi-Fi-only tablets work for most features, because the rules are stored on the device and sync over Wi-Fi. Features that depend on a connection, such as live location, need signal of some kind. Skie does not include a mobile plan or SIM, and the customer uses their own carrier if they want one.
Many hostels buy Wi-Fi tablets because they are cheaper and there is nothing to top up. Skie is fine with that. Provisioning, policies, app lists, schedules, the web filter and the compliance score all work over Wi-Fi.
Rules are cached on the device, so a tablet that loses Wi-Fi keeps applying them. When the connection comes back, a sync runs at once, and the dashboard shows last seen. Offline mode, with its own allowed apps and an organisation maximum, ends by itself when the network returns.
The dependence is on connectivity, not on a SIM. A tablet needs some way online to receive new rules, report presence and respond to a locate request. In a hostel with Wi-Fi in each block, that is usually enough. Location also behaves differently: a Wi-Fi-only tablet still has location, but inside a building it may have less to work with, and when it is off network it cannot report until it reconnects.
Where the tablet is meant to leave the hostel, such as a take-home programme, a SIM or a mobile hotspot gives you reporting off site. That is the family's or the hostel's own plan, since Skie does not provide one.
A phone is different from a tablet only in that it usually has a SIM and can make calls. Both are handled the same way.
A practical tip: map the Wi-Fi before you buy. Walk every floor with a test tablet and note the dead spots. A tablet that keeps dropping off shows up as silent, and that can look like a device problem when it is really a coverage problem.