The Best Cell Phone Plans (and How I’m Saving Big)

Chris Hutchins (0:00)

I hate wasting money, and yet for the last few years, I've been overpaying on my cell phone bill every single month on purpose, because I locked myself into a carrier that gave me a new iPhone and made it feel free. Except it definitely wasn't free, and those device credits you get almost never make up for the overpriced plan. When I dug in and ran the numbers, there were so many other carriers with plans that are less expensive, actually sometimes have better features, and run on the exact same networks. So now that my device credits are over, I am a free agent, and I am excited to get a new phone on a new carrier. And of course, I want the best deal I can get. So I went deep on this cell phone plan and carrier analysis, and today I'm gonna break down the system carriers used to make you feel good about paying more, the exact carriers and plans I'd actually consider today, including the one I'm switching to, and the amazing features some carriers now offer, like having unlimited data from multiple networks. Finally, if you're in the market for a new phone right now, I'll share how to make sure you get the best deal even if you're buying it from your existing carrier. I'm Chris Hutchins, if you enjoyed this episode, leave a comment or share it with a friend, and if you want to keep upgrading your Money, Points & Life, click follow or subscribe.

Okay, so I've been on T-Mobile for the past few years, and I loved it really, but with my contract ending and new iPhones coming out and a bunch of changes, I realized I'm a free agent, and I wanted to evaluate the situation, and I realized now I am definitely leaving. Sorry T-Mobile, you've been great to me, but when I evaluate this space, it is clear to me that I think most of us are overpaying and there's a lot of opportunity to save and even get a better product. So I'm gonna share my process to hopefully help you save a ton of time, not having to do this research, but more importantly, save a ton of money. So why is this even happening right now? Well, it is iPhone season, new iPhones just got announced, which means that my two years of device credit lock-ins from T-Mobile when I got my iPhone 16 Pro are about to expire, which really frees me up to move. I'm also very excited to try out the iPhone Duo. I feel like I've been wanting a device that could also grow to be kind of like an iPad and maybe be more usable. And so, I don't know, I'm just excited. I 3D printed a version of the Duo so I could kind of hold it and see what the shape is like. I don't know, I think it's gonna be awesome. We'll see. I'll share more after I get a chance to use it. And part of this was me trying to see how do I get a deal on that? Should I get one of these carrier deals? Well, it turns out the deals that you see advertised from carriers are not actually deals at all. Now, there might be some edge cases where that's not true, but when I ran through the options, it seemed like I was actually going to be paying so much more for the plan that even these huge discounts didn't matter. That said, I'm going to give a full rundown on how to take advantage of all these iPhone deals, even if you want to buy with a carrier, because there's a lot of mistakes that I've made in the past that I think could save you a lot of time and hassle, again, even if you're going to go that path. So let's first zoom back, talk about the lay of the land when it comes to cell phone plans. I did an episode on this exact topic three years ago, but a lot has changed, so I think it's good to come back and relook at things. First off, in the US, there are three main carriers. There's AT&T, there's Verizon, and there's T-Mobile. Now, there are some other smaller edge case carriers, but those are the primary ones, and they have their own plans, but they also have their own sub-brands, brands that they own themselves that operate on their networks. So, AT&T has Cricket, T-Mobile has Mint and Metro, Verizon has Total, Wireless, Visible, Simple, and a few others. And so, it seems crazy, but you can actually get a Verizon plan from a company that's owned by Verizon for less than Verizon itself charges by going through one of these companies they own. But there are also things called Mobile Virtual Network Operators, MVNOs, companies like US Mobile, Boost Mobile, MobileX, which are not owned by the carriers, but who use the carrier's network to provide their services.