“Today, I officially ended the era of data plans and went all-in on unlimited”, Legere told CNBC.
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The Mobile Share Advantage still keeps the benefits of previous plans such as unlimited domestic talk and text, rollover data, sharable data, worldwide perks and mobile hotspot capability. “Unlimited” data doesn’t really mean unlimited, and heavy data users can see slower data speeds once they consume 26GB of data on T-Mobile or 23GB on Sprint. If you absolutely positively must have HD video, you’re looking at paying an additional $25 per month.
AT&T isn’t exactly offering unlimited data, but the company has announced that it will offer Mobile Share Advantage plans starting August 21st.
While T-Mobile will keep its existing data plans around, Legere said during a press conference the plan is to eventually retire them, but existing customers will be able to stay in their plans if they choose.
You’ll find a video of CEO John Legere explaining the changes below, and more information can be found in T-Mobile’s press release. It’s offering Unlimited talk, text, data, and “optimized streaming video, gaming, and music”.
Still, with T-Mobile and Sprint’s moves, three of the four major USA wireless carriers are again officially offering all-you-can-eat plans. Sprint’s plan includes 5GB of high-speed tethering, which later gets throttled to 2G speeds.
Add it up and T-Mobile and Sprint are aiming to create more of a subscription model for mobile. The second line costs $40 per month. T-Mobile’s LTE network has been built for just this objective – to unleash unlimited data. Mobile Hotspot functionality is limited to 2G speed, and is also unlimited.
A one-line plan is $70 a month, while two lines is a total of $120, and four lines will cost you a total of $160. The company suggested that customers who want to pay less than $70 for unlimited could switch to a prepaid service, in which monthly bills are paid ahead of time.
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The announcement at T-Mobile specifically targets the industry’s largest wireless companies Verizon and AT&T. It’s similar to other data plans from AT&T but now without any overage charges. Of course, there are plenty of caveats here with T-Mobile’s plan.
