Best Cell phone plans

[Z3Dreamer]

Didn't see a current thread on this.

What I currently have: Verizon over-50 unlimited plan. $90 a month for DW and I. This is made up of: $80 for service, a few bucks for taxes and about $5 of sneaky admin fees. So, about $1,080 per year. I live in the mountains and have sketchy service. I have a Verizon Network Extender, but our phones do wifi calling. I bought the network extender before wifi calling was a thing. Apparently Verizon has the best network at 70%.

What I need. Save bucks. I use less than 1 GB of data per month, when home. Occasionally, when away, DW and I would use 3-4 GB. This is once every few years. My phones are 4G LTE.

Options: Mint Mobile appears to be the cheapest MVNO (mobile virtual network operator). They use the T-Mobile network (which is in 3rd place at 62%). Cost would be $360 per year total for two lines. This is for their old folks unlimited plan. Ryan Reynolds supposedly owns 20% to 25% of the company. Don't know how that changes the deal.

My internet search of "Best cell phone plan for seniors" finds tons of choices. So what cheap, 3GB or greater, reliable plan do you use and recommend? Or what plan do you NOT recommend?

 

[braumeister]

Maybe not extremely current, but if you do a bit of searching here you'll find many relevant threads.

 

[Z3Dreamer]

Maybe not extremely current, but if you do a bit of searching here you'll find many relevant threads.

I thought so, but I searched for "cell phone". Didn't find much. Just now, searched for "plans" and found a recent 2 week old thread. Thanks. Will continue with that one.

 

[pb4uski]

DW uses airvoicewireless, an AT&T MVNO. $18/month on autorenew with unlimited talk and text and 3gb data. I have a similar plan from Red Pocket that is $21.21/month but they can do either CDMA (Verizon) or GSMA (AT&T) or GSMT(T-Mobile).

Another MVNO that is popular is Consumer Cellular... AT&T MVNO and $20/month.

We've been paying less than $40/month for the two of us for many years now.

 

[bloom2708]

Get a test SIM for Mint Mobile and see what your coverage is like.

We are happy with Mint (T-mobile) We pay for 1 year in advance and T-Mobile coverage has dramatically improved over the past 2-3 years.

Another Verizon MVNO won't make sense because the coverage will be the same.

H20 Mobile uses AT&T and has decent plans. It might be another option if you want to veer away from Verizon.

 

[nassa]

Take a look at https://prepaidcompare.net, click on Plans and select your criteria.

Note that some MVNOs do not support wifi calling but there is a checkbox to select that if you want to keep it.

 

[Qs Laptop]

My internet search of "Best cell phone plan for seniors" finds tons of choices. So what cheap, 3GB or greater, reliable plan do you use and recommend? Or what plan do you NOT recommend?

I'm sounding like a broken record here but, US Mobile. You can pick either Verizon network or T-Mobile network as the underlying carrier. You can pick how much data you want, as low as 1GB, or as high as unlimited ("unlimited" here means 100GB per month on Verizon.)

For example all four family members here are on Unlimited Premium, which is $30 a month plus taxes. This is their Gucci plan, includes everything. (There is a discount for having multi-lines on the same plan.)

I also have a 5GB, unlimited talk and text plan on an old phone that costs me $19/month (includes taxes.) I will be putting the SIM card from this phone into my new tablet. You can build just about any data plan you want and the prices are rock bottom.

For comparison, on our previous Verizon plan, all four of us were sharing 10GB of data and our monthly bill was $174.

I've had US Mobile for four months now and I haven't noticed any difference in call quality or coverage compared to my Verizon plan. I have noticed a huge difference in savings.

I recommend US Mobile over other Verizon MVNO's because if you have a 5G phone they do not throttle your speeds (but 4G phones are subject to deprioritization.) They have full 4K video capabilities. They have an 800#, chat, and email help. They also have freebies, like Spotify, streaming TV services, games, etc. which I haven't tapped into yet.

I do not recommend Visible because while they might be slightly less expensive they throttle your speeds, do not have live customer service (no 800#), their video is capped at 480p, their hotspot speeds are capped, they do not offer T-Mobile, etc.

 

[Cobra9777]

We've made lots of changes since acquiring our camper van. When traveling we use 2-3GB per day, sometimes more. And we need our phones on different networks. Previously we had RedPocket plans similar to what pb4uski described... DW had 3GB of data on Verizon for $20/mo and I had 8GB on AT&T for $19/mo. Total $39/mo for both lines, but only 11GB of data combined, which was not enough when we travel.

So now with our high data requirements, we have DW on Visible for $25/mo... same Verizon network but with truly unlimited data (no high-speed cap), including hotspot. Hotspot is throttled to 5Mbps and video streaming is throttled to ~2Mbps. It's also deprioritized vs postpaid Verizon customers. But so far this has worked very well for us when traveling.

I'm on Tello for $29/mo... It uses the T-Mobile network with great 5G speed on my Pixel 6. I get 25GB of high speeed data with no limitations on hotspot or video streaming. We use this on hotspot when traveling if the signal strength is stronger than DW's Verizon... or if the throttling on Visible is being problematic, which does happen.

Overall, we pay $54/mo for two lines... unlimited data on Verizon (with some limitations) and 25GB on T-Mobile (no limitations). Of course both have unlimited voice/text.

 

[euro]

DW and I are doing very well with Ting. Unlimited calling and Texts and 1Gb of data. Cost for both lines combined is $25 a month which ends up being $29.62 a month after taxes.
If you only need extra data once every few years then that makes very little difference. You will pay an extra 5 or 10 bucks for that one month which spread out over, say 3 years would only add an extra 14-28 cents a month. Still under $30 for two lines.
My only slight beef is that while most international calls are 5 cents or less per minute, the country I personally am most interested (Switzerland) is still 30 cents a minute. Not CRAZY expensive but also not cheap. But if you don't routinely call Switzerland or a couple of other odd places, then this shouldn't be a problem for oyu.

 

[RetiredAndLovingIt]

Tello $10 a month each for 1GB or $14 for 2GB plus unlimited calls/texts also a T-mobile MVNO.
On months when you need to use more you can change your plan to a higher level with no penalties or fees and then drop back down the next month and you don't need to call them, you can do it yourself in the app.
My favorite feature is that if you manually renew your plan the day before it auto renews which takes less than a minute to do, you get to rollover all your unused data (does not apply to unlimited data/minute plans) for free.
Make sure your phone is unlocked before you leave Verizon if got it from them. I think they have to do it on request after a certain time by law but I'm not 100% sure on that.
I usually just buy my phones unlocked when they're on sale so I don't have to deal with issue.

 

[Cobra9777]

I'm sounding like a broken record here but, US Mobile. You can pick either Verizon network or T-Mobile network as the underlying carrier. You can pick how much data you want, as low as 1GB, or as high as unlimited ("unlimited" here means 100GB per month on Verizon.)

For example all four family members here are on Unlimited Premium, which is $30 a month plus taxes. This is their Gucci plan, includes everything. (There is a discount for having multi-lines on the same plan.)

I also have a 5GB, unlimited talk and text plan on an old phone that costs me $19/month (includes taxes.) I will be putting the SIM card from this phone into my new tablet. You can build just about any data plan you want and the prices are rock bottom.

For comparison, on our previous Verizon plan, all four of us were sharing 10GB of data and our monthly bill was $174.

I've had US Mobile for four months now and I haven't noticed any difference in call quality or coverage compared to my Verizon plan. I have noticed a huge difference in savings.

I recommend US Mobile over other Verizon MVNO's because if you have a 5G phone they do not throttle your speeds (but 4G phones are subject to deprioritization.) They have full 4K video capabilities. They have an 800#, chat, and email help. They also have freebies, like Spotify, streaming TV services, games, etc. which I haven't tapped into yet.

I do not recommend Visible because while they might be slightly less expensive they throttle your speeds, do not have live customer service (no 800#), their video is capped at 480p, their hotspot speeds are capped, they do not offer T-Mobile, etc.

You and I both seem to enjoy this topic. I think I've posted this before... I like US Mobile but only on the Verizon side. The T-Mobile offering is not competitive at all. On Verizon, their "unlimited" plan caps hotspot at 50GB. Hotspot is what travelers like us care about. 50GB for $50 is nothing special. Redpocket has the same offer on Verizon, or 100GB for $50 on AT&T.

Also, with Visible, the throttling does not appear to be enforced at all times. Same for video streaming. We've been able to stream at 720p and even 1080p at certain times of the day. $25/mo for no-cap hotspot is a truly unique offering.

DW's phone is 4G only. So priority data on US Mobile/Verizon would not benefit us. My Pixel 6 is 5G but I prefer T-Mobile's flavor of 5G for now. And we need our phones on different networks.

US Mobile would be more attractive for us if the T-Mobile offering was same as Verizon, and if the unlimited plan allowed all 100GB to be used for hotspot.

 

[swakyaby]

I have been happy with the low cost plans by Mint mobile. I chose the 4 GB data with unlimited talk and text for $15/month. Last year, I prepaid for 6 months and received the following 6 months free. This year, I will be prepaying for 12 months for $180. I have not come close to reaching my 4 GB limit, but adding more data is as simple as opening the Mint app and selecting the add data choices for an additional $10. It will then revert back to the original plan the next month.

 

[swakyaby]

OP, with your low data usage, it seems to make more financial sense to change from an unlimited data plan to a 3 or 4 GB data plan. Then, for those infrequent times you travel and need to add more data, just open the mobile app on your phone and select more data. Really easy, convenient, and much less cost.

 

[ncbill]

Didn't see a current thread on this.

What I currently have: Verizon over-50 unlimited plan. $90 a month for DW and I. This is made up of: $80 for service, a few bucks for taxes and about $5 of sneaky admin fees. So, about $1,080 per year. I live in the mountains and have sketchy service. I have a Verizon Network Extender, but our phones do wifi calling. I bought the network extender before wifi calling was a thing. Apparently Verizon has the best network at 70%.

What I need. Save bucks. I use less than 1 GB of data per month, when home. Occasionally, when away, DW and I would use 3-4 GB. This is once every few years. My phones are 4G LTE.

Options: Mint Mobile appears to be the cheapest MVNO (mobile virtual network operator). They use the T-Mobile network (which is in 3rd place at 62%). Cost would be $360 per year total for two lines. This is for their old folks unlimited plan. Ryan Reynolds supposedly owns 20% to 25% of the company. Don't know how that changes the deal.

My internet search of "Best cell phone plan for seniors" finds tons of choices. So what cheap, 3GB or greater, reliable plan do you use and recommend? Or what plan do you NOT recommend?

"I live in the mountains and have sketchy service."

You need to test & see which underlying provider works decently in your area.

Here Verizon still has the broadest geographic coverage.

Mint is a cheap way to test T-Mobile coverage in your area.

Don't forget to test AT&T's coverage as well.

 

[FutureFIRE]

Visible has changed their pricing structure, $30 and $45 plans going forward. No more party pay, etc. but it also includes some other perks. https://www.visible.com/plans/

I am staying on my $25 since i use alot of hot spot (which is unlimited) when i travel in RV. The word unlimited rarely means unlimited but for Visible I am not aware of any data caps (yes throttling at 5Mbps but an unlimited amount of it)

 

[Cobra9777]

Visible has changed their pricing structure, $30 and $45 plans going forward. No more party pay, etc. but it also includes some other perks. https://www.visible.com/plans/

I am staying on my $25 since i use alot of hot spot (which is unlimited) when i travel in RV. The word unlimited rarely means unlimited but for Visible I am not aware of any data caps (yes throttling at 5Mbps but an unlimited amount of it)

This video explains the changes better than the Visible website:

https://youtu.be/suWUFQ85NV8

I think we will stay on the $25 legacy plan as long as possible. Rumor is we'll have to switch or lose the party pay discounts by Jan 1, 2023.

The $30 plan is pretty good. You still get "regular" 5G but they removed access to Verizon's UW 5G. But you now get domestic roaming and better ping times. Basically the two new plans are on the regular Verizon network. Previously, Visible traffic was routed through a few special data centers that only gave access to native Verizon towers. So the new plans not only have drastically better ping times, but also better rural coverage since you get access to all their domestic roaming partners.

The $45 plan is too pricey for me. All it adds is 5G UW, 50GB of priority data, and roaming in Canada/Mexico. Not worth the extra $15/mo for us.

 

[Scusan]

We have Xfinity cable which makes us eligible for their mobile plan, on the Verizon network.
We have two phones and use little data, generally less than 1 GB/month and our bill for both is around 15 bucks. Extra data is 10 or 12/GB so we'd need to change if we used more.

 

[Time2]

About 3 weeks ago I went with AT&T's $300 a year prepaid plan. I paid the $300 up front, but I think you can do it $25 a month also. It's working fine for me.

 

[skyking1]

Thanks for all the contributions. We have been on my brother's Verizon business plan for years, and even after he sold the business in exchange for a whole lot of tech support back in the day. They never call me anymore and we are going to make the change. I'd do Xfinity but they do not offer service in our planned retirement area, so not going down that trail. I think a test sim from Mint is the ticket.

 

[Midpack]

We just switched from Verizon when they “notified” our plan was going to $96/mo, to T-Mobile at $70/mo. I know there are far cheaper options, but DW won’t consider anyone outside the big three. I’ve explained MVNO’s to her, no dice. I’ve learned to pick my battles after 42 years…

 

[gauss]

DW and I both have Tello and the cost is about $7/month each.

We each receive 1GB of data for our $7 and are able to rollover the data if we manually renew before the auto renew date each month. This would help with your occasional surge in usage while travelling. (I think DW and I have each banked between 15 and 20 GB total by not using the full 1 GB each month).

Tello is a MVNO for T-Mobile. Tello may be a better lower cost match for you than Mint and would only cost about 10% of what you are currently paying with Verizon.

The thing that you would loose is access to the in-store sales people, but Tello does have online and telephone customer support that did not seem to be offshored when I called them once, so that was good.

-gauss

 

[Ready]

Didn't see a current thread on this.

What I currently have: Verizon over-50 unlimited plan. $90 a month for DW and I. This is made up of: $80 for service, a few bucks for taxes and about $5 of sneaky admin fees. So, about $1,080 per year. I live in the mountains and have sketchy service. I have a Verizon Network Extender, but our phones do wifi calling. I bought the network extender before wifi calling was a thing. Apparently Verizon has the best network at 70%.

What I need. Save bucks. I use less than 1 GB of data per month, when home. Occasionally, when away, DW and I would use 3-4 GB. This is once every few years. My phones are 4G LTE.

Options: Mint Mobile appears to be the cheapest MVNO (mobile virtual network operator). They use the T-Mobile network (which is in 3rd place at 62%). Cost would be $360 per year total for two lines. This is for their old folks unlimited plan. Ryan Reynolds supposedly owns 20% to 25% of the company. Don't know how that changes the deal.

My internet search of "Best cell phone plan for seniors" finds tons of choices. So what cheap, 3GB or greater, reliable plan do you use and recommend? Or what plan do you NOT recommend?

Is the Verizon plan available outside of Florida?

 

[Z3Dreamer]

Is the Verizon plan available outside of Florida?

Not really. I am on a senior plan that costs $80 plus taxes and fees for two lines. I am not in FLA. Looks like the 55+ plan is only available to FLA customers but existing customers are not cancelled.

 

[RetiredAndLovingIt]

Just an FYI for Tello users. Tello responded to a question on Reddit regarding their lack of eSim support and it's a go. The iPhone 14 will be eSim only

3 hr. ago
Tello Representative
Hi there,

You don't need to worry! Just like we announced a while back we've been working for a few months to offer our users eSIM support. eSIM will be available on Tello by the end of this month, just in time to use it with the new iPhone 14

Thank you so much for your interest in our service!

 

[mpeirce]

For me "Best Cell phone plan” doesn’t necessarily mean the cheapest.

I have an ATT family plan which includes unlimited voice, text, and data for my extended family. It’s a nice way to help out my parents and DS.

It also includes a cellular hot spot I use as backup internet at our house if the cable internet goes down (rare, but it does happen) and Apple Watch so I don’t have to carry my phone all the time but can still be in touch if need be.

It’s less that $50 per person (even included my two extra devices), though that does included a small discount because of my old employer that I haven’t work for in over 10 years.