<p>That about says it all. We currently have an ancient, cheap plan with Sprint that can’t be bought anymore, but kid’s phone is almost completely dead, and she needs something smart for work. I could use a smart phone too. Happydad would just take pictures with his. We aren’t picky about carriers, and can stay with Sprint or leave. At the Apple store we were told that T-Mobile is the least expensive for their plans, but that coverage is not as good as other carriers. I’ve checked, and T-Mobile coverage is about the same where the kid is and where we are.</p>
<p>Depends on what you will be doing with your phone and how reception is where you plan to use the phone. We have Sprint with unlimited data because S wanted to have that as an option and none of the other carriers offered unlimited data without some “throttle back.” He didn’t want throttling. My brother and his family have tmobile–$120 for 4 lines with unlimited text and phone and some gigs of data per person (can’t remember the details). They were happy at how cheap it was. </p>
<p>Once, we had tmobile for all of us and it was the cheapest but in the 5 apartments my kids lived in over the summer, NONE could get reception IN the apartment! We switched to Verizon and most recently after that expired to Sprint.</p>
<p>If you’re not sure about reception, ask around others who have the company you are considering using. You could also buy at Costco and have a set number of days to return with no penalty.</p>
<p>We have a family plan with ATT. Three smartphones with unlimited talk and text, and shared 10 gigs of data. I have to say…we haven’t come even close to using all of that data plan each month…not close. Most places have wifi, and we use that. It’s about $145 a month for that plan for all of us. I think it’s called Family Talk.</p>
<p>My son has an old unlimited data plan…and we are encouraging him to ditch it in favor of something less costly. He never comes close to using a ton of data. When he originally got this unlimited data plan, wifi wasn’t as readily available…but now it is. </p>
<p>HImom, why does your son need so much data? Can’t he access wifi?</p>
<p>It’s going to depend on where you use the phones. We recently switched from Verizon iPhones to tmobile iPhones. There was a noticeable drop in LTE coverage but the phones do still work fine and our monthly bill is also noticeably less. It’s been a tradeoff, but for now, we are happy saving the money and being contract free.</p>
<p>Virgin Mobile is on Sprint’s network and iphones are $30/month with 300 minutes and unlimited text and data ($35 if you don’t want autopay). You buy the phone. iphones are pricey, lots of less $ Android options (in which case same plan is $35/mo). No contract and phones are easy to resell if you decide to switch. We’ve had it for 3 years now, love it.</p>
<p>We have had T mobile for 16 years. Bad coverage when we are at the beach or the lake. But, no probs elsewhere. </p>
<p>Love the T mobile free international data and texting. This saved a lot of hassle buying UK pre paid card etc when we were back " home" this summer. We could text each other for free and for friends not with iphones we could facetime message them. Since we travel overseas regularly this is a huge plus for us.</p>
<p>Our S doesn’t have wifi in his place. He travels a ton and likes to be able to use his phone. No idea about D’s wifi us vs. other data. H and I mostly use in-home wifi and not so much data. The $225 is a bit high for the 4 of us, but we are OK with it for the POTENTIAL unlimited data. S spends a lot of time in DC, Arlington, Orlando, LA and SF where they have LTE. We don’t get much LTE in Honolulu, so it is sort of a waste for us, but we let S choose.</p>
<p>I pay 32 bucks a month at Sprint with unlimited data, talk/text and have an iphone 5. That is only because I got in a promotion through AAA insurance and in a family plan.</p>
<p>Verizon is bit more expensive BUT I hope to never again need T-Mobile’s service. My daughter’s father placed her on his phone plan, T-Mobile, over the summer. When I took her to school in August, her phone would not work. I just thought she was in a bad area and the phone service would eventually come back. Little did I know, T-Mobile did not work in the town her school is located. In this day and time, I did not expect this.</p>
<p>I had to get her a Verizon plan and purchase another phone. And here I thought I was going to save some money by having her father put her on his T-Mobile plan.</p>
<p>My two older kids both have T mobile and can’t use their phones in my house. To make or take a call they have to go outside and even then it’s iffy. D has better luck at her apartment, but not much, and S gets the best reception when he’s working down in OR. WE had T mobile when we moved to this house and ended up getting our plan cancelled and our money back because the tech couldn’t even get his own calls through while he was here “helping”. </p>
<p>Only go with T mobile if you’re absolutely sure-like you’ve had a friend use their T mobile in your house-that it will work. WE pay more for Verizon but it’s the only carrier that actually works where we live.</p>
<p>You tmobile people: if you have issues at home, dorms or offices just enable ’calling over WiFi’ on your phone and you’ll have perfect service. The price is so much cheaper than the others and unlimited everything!</p>
<p>We have Verizon because it works best in our area. I was visiting a friend last week who was at her summer cottage. She has sprint. It was a pain because it doesn’t work well there and contacting her is hit or miss. Her place is in a town not out at a lake so I can’t imagine what it’s like there. </p>
<p>My family switched to ATT and thought the coverage was not as good so the kids decided to switch back to Verizon as soon as they could. Things are different as both of my kids are out of college and pay for their own phone. My H has a work iPhone so I only pay for myself. On the family plan I pay $60/month for my share to share 4g of data which we’ve come close to but have never gone over with 5 people on the plan. </p>
<p>This is how I feel about this. I live in a rural area with a husband who travels quite a bit. I do not want myself or him to be out and get in an accident and not be able to get a call out because I’m trying to max out the data I want to use. Having a phone that works in the most places to get a call out or to receive a call is what is important to me. </p>
<p>Btw, my neighbor hit a deer yesterday on his way home from the grocery store. The phone came in handy. </p>
<p>We had TMobile for years and the coverage was okay – not great, but okay. The customer service though? Unbelieveably bad, ineffective, slow, and made me dread having a problem. We switched to AT&T and have fabulous coverage and super customer service. It is, however, more expensive than the pittance we paid to TMobile, but worth every penny. The money I saved in Advil…</p>
<p>AT&T’s Cricket Wireless offers 5 lines of phone, text, and data for $100/month…including taxes. It is a prepaid service using AT&T 4G LTE towers. Extra data can be purchased if needed for reasonable fees. If you already own GSM AT&T phones, you can use them with the Cricket service…they’ll port your present number over after putting one of their sims in your existing phone if you don’t want to buy new phone.</p>
<p>We just switched to T-mobile, 4 lines for $100/month. We had to buy the phones but both boys are happy with their $100 Galaxy Lite smartphones. This business is getting really competitive, so while T-mobile stands out right now as the cheapest 4 phone family plan, others will match soon. I think I just saw an ad for Verizon that looked comparable. </p>
<p>(I do really like the feature of making calls over wireless when it is available - like in our home for example. ATT wireless coverage was so bad we could barely use the cellphones at home)</p>
<p>Thanks for all the feedback! I had a conversation with the phone expert at Target today: Verizon & ATT are the best carriers here, Sprint is OK, and T-Mobile barely works at all. So T-Mobile is out for Happydad & me. The young man at Target put in a good word for the pre-paid services, so I’m investigating them next. I’ve decided that it doesn’t matter if I can port the current phone numbers from Sprint or not to the new cell phones. It turns out that I could just port them all to Google Voice, and link them up with the new gadgets/house phone line/whatever.</p>
<p>I have Sprint and I’ve had no problem with coverage. $80/mo for unlimited voice, data and text. My D is in another city and she also has no problem. </p>
<p>Are you committed to iPhone? I got my Samsung Galaxy when I signed up with Sprint and paid $150 for it.</p>
<p>I would just stay with Sprint, stay out of contract and purchase newer (maybe not brand new) Sprint network phones from eBay or Swappa. Once you buy the new(er to you) phone, you go online and its easy to just activate the new phone (deactivated your old phone) by inputting the new ESN number from the new(er) phone. Sprint does not charge for this. Easy. You get to keep your plan, just get a new phone without committing to another 2 years. You are bringing your own phone to the plan, especially if you like your old plan, especially with the unlimited data.</p>