FreedomPop Less than $5/month, 12-Month Prepaid Plan - 3-in-1 LTE SIM Kit - Unlimited Talk, Text, & 1GB Data

This is the cheapest phone service around. For 1/GB data per month + text/call this is perfect for me as a fairly average user and all for 50 or less per year! Here are my tips.1. Do not rely on Customer Service from FreedomPop. There is no number you can call, but you can submit a ticket and a community user may reply and help. Googling also can help as they have forums where people ask questions.2. For Android users, consider using Google Voice. The app is 100x better than FreedomPop's and works fine along with it. It's free with any Google account. The text and talk does consume data though so be careful, but more particularly with the talk since texting takes minimal data.3. Do not give FreedomPop you payment details, even for bonus data. You could get auto charged for things.4. Use wi-fi as much as possible. Avoid video streaming on mobile data because that will wipe out the monthly allotment quickly. If you are playing games and watching Youtube or Netflix all the time while on the go, this won't work out well. I just use a few simple apps like email, maps, and weather here and there throughout the day and it works fine.5. I don't know how this service works internationally. It is supposed to be a global GSM card but not have tested it.6. Mobile data runs from AT&T towers, so coverage should be fairly wide spread. I haven't had any roaming issues so far.7. The data does not rollover monthly. It's use it or lose it.8. Works fine for Android. I don't use Apple products so can't speak for those.

I have been a Freedompop user for a while and when this prepaid GSM plan came out I was excited because I thought I could finally use an affordable GSM sim for an unlimited talk, text, and 1GB of data. Why? because on the regular CDMA service the phone must be compatible with Freedompop (very few phones qualify in the market and you are stuck in buying either from freedompop store which has a lot of used/refurbished phones. In the past, you could just buy a sprint phone brand new and use with the CDMA service but that's not the case due to some changes by sprint on who can use their phone on other careers that use sprint towers) and even then to change the phone you have to order a new sim card and activate a new line with a temporary number and finally transfer your number to the new sim that you register with the new phone. Bottom line if your phone breaks it's a disaster to change your phone and keep the same number and you have to do all these changes either by opening an online ticket or if you are paying for premium service you could call but even then you will be transferred at least a couple of times to bunch of incompetent customer service people that either don't understand what you are trying to do or just try to sell you new line/service.Now back to why the GSM sim seemed like a great change from CDMA because with GSM you should be able to just place the sim in any GSM unlocked phone and that's all it takes to change the phone with the same the sim. However, what the plan or the packaging doesn't say however is that the sim card uses GSM sim card to connect to the internet over and it doesn't use the GSM towers for calls. That means that if the internet is not good in a specific area the voice quality suffers. Having been using the freedompop CDMA service (which uses sprint) I was under the impression that I can just purchase an add-on to my account for an extra monthly/yearly fee to use the "premium voice" that use the towers to route the calls (more reliable for call quality) rather than using the LTE internet (which can be spotty and unreliable in many locations). That was not the case. These sims provide the phone with an LTE internet and the freedompop app solely uses the internet service to send and receive call and texts without the option to use the GSM towers for incoming and outgoing calls. It doesn't end there, with Freedompop you are NOT able to cap your DATA to the 1GB that is included in the plan (no such thing exist on your account) so what ends up happening is that you are either going over the 1GB which you need to pay for OR you need to limit the internet usage on your smartphone after 1GB which is not feasible because the phone mistakes all the calls (since they use internet) as data so it can't accurately stop you at 1GB. Even if you somehow could exclude the calling data out from the 1GB the minute your phone disables your data usage after 1GB you no longer able to send or receive calls/texts. So you are forced to disable any data cap restriction from your smartphone and be careful not to go over the allotted data. Since apps run in the background and many of them use internet for syncing you almost always go over unless are not using the internet at all and are using it just for calls and text. So it's just like a Data usage trap that sooner or later you have to pay for overcharges.Oh by the way LTE sim means you don't can't use 2G and 3G either so check the coverage area on fb site for LTE only in case you are in some rural area because LTE signals are still spotty in many places in the country and unlike other services that switch to 2G/3G when LTE is not avaulable with this sim you are left with no reception.

Have to say I am very happy with how well this cost-effective prepaid plan is working. Got the sim card and activated it without any hiccups, put it into a moto G6 phone and voilà phone has been working flawlessly. Did not get any additional options and so no need to give CC info. Great phone reception at home and while out and about and text msgs coming and going through without any issues for 2 weeks now. Haven't been using very much data since I'm on my home wifi most of the time. Will post update if there is any glitches.

I don't understand why this product is receiving so many negative reviews. This product is awesome!I have unlocked iPhone SE and this SIM works like a charm. I constantly use Wifi and rarely need 4G network (like only when I commute), so this product suits my needs perfectly. Less than $3 a month for 1G of data is simply outrageously ridiculous deal! It makes me think how foolish I was paying more than $40/month in the past for the data which I barely used. AT&T connectivity is good as other cellular carriers, but I recommend checking it before you make a purchase. Also, I would highly recommend using Google Voice instead of using the inbuilt phone service as it is more versatile and reliable in my opinion.Word of caution: if you use data intensely (like more than 1G/month obviously) I would not recommend using this product. This product suits a person who uses Wifi on a regular basis and 4G as just a segway to hop from one Wifi to another. There is no way to add data during a given month when you are out. You just have to wait for the next window period!