Ahead of Merger, T-Mobile Announces Its Cheapest Phone Plan Ever and 5G Coming December 6th

The T-Mobile and Sprint merger hasn't been officially completed yet, but that hasn't stopped the "Un-carrier" from talking about what it will do with its newfound resources. T-Mobile announced today that it plans to launch the company's cheapest phone plan ever and roll out its 5G network starting December 6th. Gizmodo reports: Starting at just $15 a month, the new T-Mobile Connect plan offers unlimited talk and text plus 2GB of 4G or 5G data. Now admittedly, 2GB of data per month isn't all that much, but considering the T-Mobile's current least expensive plans start at $30 a month (and that's including a discount for having four lines), T-Mobile Connect could provide some much-needed savings for low-income families -- at least temporarily while it gathers all the goodwill it can muster in the merger process. Additionally, T-Mobile also teased two other new programs with its Connecting Heroes Initiative, which promises to give unlimited talk, text and 5G access to every first responder in the U.S. for the next 10 years. This includes public and non-profit fire, police, and EMS personnel. Then there's T-Mobile's Project 10 Million, which promises to handout 10 million hotspots to students across the country that will provide up to 100GB of free mobile data per year. With Project 10 Million, T-Mobile is hoping to give children and students greater access to broadband internet in order to make completing homework just a bit easier.

Also, next month T-Mobile says it will turn on its nationwide 5G network on December 6th, which promises to bring 5G coverage to over 200 million Americans in more than 5,000 cities. That said, this 5G network won't have the combined resources of both T-Mobile and Sprint until sometime in 2020 when T-Mobile can integrate its mmWave and sub-6GHz spectrum with Sprint's mid-brand spectrum. Looking even further ahead, T-Mobile claims its new 5G network will offer 14 times more capacity than it could on its own, and that the combined T-Mobile/Sprint network will cover 85 percent of the rural U.S. within three years, and 90 percent coverage after six years.

Re:

[Fly Swatter]

TeeHee, my local mall has a T-Mobile building in it's parking lot AND they took over the old Radio Shack within the mall. Seems wasteful to have both... when they are empty most of the time. I have an old prepaid account where I pay by the minute however I can keep service going just by adding 10 bucks once a year. I guess that $15 per month is ok if you are a big user with friends and such.

Re:

[Ryzilynt]

TeeHee, my local mall has a T-Mobile building in it's parking lot AND they took over the old Radio Shack within the mall. Seems wasteful to have both... when they are empty most of the time. I have an old prepaid account where I pay by the minute however I can keep service going just by adding 10 bucks once a year. I guess that $15 per month is ok if you are a big user with friends and such.

Yes of course. And the phone you speak of is likely a suitcase that you keep in your trunk , and runs on D-cell batteries. but i'm sure you are using rechargeable D-cell batteries. I'd wager that most people are paying far more than $15 a month for cell service these days. $15 a month wouldn't cover my text messaging on pay as you go. Your post smells like troll, but your account is so old. Maybe you just like to fuck with people sometimes for fun?

And yes , of course t-mobile is highly mismanaged. In th

Re:

[arkane1234]

I know you're joking around but you know their signal isn't some ancient thing, right?

just making sure, so you're not misinformed.

Re:

[dwillden]

I've seen close proximity store placements like that. Usually one is actually the carrier's store, the other is a branded device retail franchise that sells devices but doesn't do much in the way of support, they just refer you to the other store if you have billing or device questions beyond how much for that new phone with all the features.

The kicker was that if you purchase a device or set-up a new account at the corp. store you agreed to the early termination fee ETF (I know those are mostly dead now),

Boost Mobile Customers?

[Cmdln Daco]

I am paying for a Boost Mobile phone at present. It's a phone locked to Boost, and hence to Sprint. I have heard that the Boost part of Sprint is being split off to Dish. I wonder if my locked Boost phone will work on this new plan from T-Mobile. It's locked to Sprint in the details in settings.

Not for me

[DogDude]

I want to pay more money for better service. I want to pay even more for private service.

Re:

[wooferhound]

You want to pay more for service
AT&T was made for you . . .

Re:

[Ryzilynt]

You want to pay more for service
AT&T was made for you . . .

I was with AT&T for the first 12 years I had cell service. Until I realized they were the devil and that they had an anti-loyalty program. The longer you are with them the more they try to gauge you on price.

Dear cell providers : Take half the money you flush down the toilet in marketing to swap customers between platforms every few years and use it to RETAIN loyal customers.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[rmdingler]

clap...clap...clap

You win the internet today, sir.

Re:

[jezwel]

You missed the part where a whole bunch of people are made redundant to get rid of the 2 people 1 role thing that goes on when big mergers occur. This is partly where that "$x billion synergistic savings per year" is meant to come from. Pretty spot on though.

Re:

[bluefoxlucid]

Well, that and reducing the number of duplicate facilities. We've been doing that generally with something called "The Cloud" lately where you pay hundreds of thousands of dollars a year instead of running your own data center for millions of dollars.

5g?

[burtosis]

Considering 5g hits peak speeds of 20Gbps, now I can literally blow through a 2GB plan in less than a second. It's kind of like driving a lambo with a shot glass gas tank.

Re: 5g?

[KixWooder]

I keep hearing this analogy but it's silly. I use less than 1gb/month on my unlimited T-Mobile plan; how fast I can download x amount of data is a pointless measure because i use it in spurts, not all at once.

Re:

[chrism238]

Agreed; moreover, the data that you're downloading certainly won't be transmitted or received at 20Gbps. Stupid analogy.

Re:

[dwillden]

But if the bandwidth is there the media will increase in resolution to use more. And you are not their target audience. Just because you don't use a lot of streaming video on your device doesn't mean there aren't many who do and who find even 4 and 5 gb caps painful at times. And when the bandwidth increases and all the streaming services set their autoplay tools to default to 4k video streams (because they can't bother to check the screen size and resolution being used) That 1 gb or 2 or 4 will be burn

Re:

[burtosis]

If you use almost no data, why do you need speeds faster than 4g? At 20Mbs, not at all fast for 4g, that's your plan in 800 seconds or about 13 minutes. 5g would make no sense at all.

Re: 5g?

[KixWooder]

5g is a joke anyway. It has been from the beginning.

Re:

[AHuxley]

That would need a map of the area to find the tower and the account will have a top speed limit per user due to the design of the network.
Whats the max up/down network speed any US network will grant a new trendy 5g smartphone account?

Re:

[hawk]

>It's kind of like driving a lambo with a shot glass gas tank.

strange that you should mention this . . . one of this weekend's tasks is reinstalling and adjusting the carburetor on my 500cid 72 Cadillac . . . which involves repeatedly emptying a half-full shot glass of gasoline into the carb . . . it's enough to kick it over and run for about an entire second . . .

hawk

Whats the catch?

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Beware of phone companies bearing gifts,

Re:

[AHuxley]

The user has to want to upgrade to 5g...
Accept all the new conditions that go with a new "upgrade" to a 5g smartphone account.
The fine print changes when accepting a new smartphone and 5g might make it all worth it long term as a "gift" from the "phone companies".
New and very exact rules, terms, limits can be added when selling/accepting 5g as a new service...

Wrong

[jabberw0k]

Cheapest plan for some years now has been $3 a month, with 30 minutes talk time or 30 text messages and zero data. I have had their old "Gold" plan for 10 or 15 years, which is 1000 minutes/messages for $100 a year (you have to be grandfathered in).

For those of us who use a mobile telephone as a away-from-home telephone, and never exceed that a few minutes a month, even $15 a month is pointless.

Re:

[b0s0z0ku]

Their cheapest current UNLIMITED plan is also $15 ($20 talk + text less $5 autopay discount). I haven't paid them anything near $30/mo for years.

Re:

[ShoulderOfOrion]

Actually, I'm a Gold "grandfather" too. Once you paid $100 for a year's worth of minutes, you can keep the plan going by buying another 100 minutes for $10 every year (so 83 cents a month). 12 years later, I'm on my third phone and I've spent about $250 total for cell service. I use WiFi for data and ignore calls/texts anyway, so it works for me too. I'm hoping the Gold plan will survive this merger.

Article is incorrect...

[b0s0z0ku]

T-mobile's cheapest current plan isn't $30 per month. It's $15. I'm on the $20 talk + text only plan with $5 autopay discount. It sounds like they're adding a minimal amount of data to that plan.

Re:

[SeaFox]

Is that after taxes and fees? I have unlimited talk and text and get 30 MB (that's not a typo) of high speed data (unlimited low-speed) and I'm paying $29-30 a month out the door. I'm on autopay but I'm not aware of there being any $5 discount for it.

This new plan sounds great assuming it's still post-paid. T-Mobile has different support queues for prepaid and post-paid accounts.

About that price

[spinitch]

Reports T-Mobile reviewing the merger price considering lowering for new developments, not contemplated in initial deal. Sprint and especially SB bargaining power does not appear to be gaining.

Assuming it throttles after 2GB, not bad.

[twocows]

I go through Red Pocket, an MVNO, and pay $10/mo for 300MB of data. That's a pretty substantial step up for an extra $5/mo. I'd still stay with my plan since I never even come close to hitting my 300MB each month, but I know a lot of people who might want to get something like this.

MVNO Mint Mobile offers 3GB/month for same price

[kimgkimg]

TMobile MVNO Mint Mobile offers the same deal but with 3GB/month (you have to prepay for 12 months.) I was on TMobile Pay As You Go, but after see my usages go up, it ended up being cheaper to switch to Mint. http://fbuy.me/n7onr [fbuy.me] (referral link, if anyone's interested.)