anyone had luck with these fly-by night cell carriers?

I see ads all the time for shit like consumer Cellular, mint mobile, stuff that rents time on Verizon towers and sells you a plan for like half the price.

I'm trying real hard to de-Xfinity myself but the cellular plan is the cheapest of all the major companies. Yes, I know they also piggyback off the Verizon network, but at least they have 24/7 support

TurdMongler ,

Just switched to US Mobile after doing the 30 day trial.

Bill from AT&T prepaid was $65 before tax.

Now I'm $29 total. On their GSM(T-Mobile) network I was pulling 250 down.

pelletbucket OP ,
@pelletbucket@lemm.ee avatar

how does the trial work? is it legitimately free? do you have to use your own phone?

TurdMongler ,

I happened to have a spare number that I wasn't using with JMP.chat. So I ported it over to US Mobile.

They offered a 30 day trial if you port a number over. They probably still offer the trial. I still have a week left and I liked the service so much I already ported my real number over. The trial was completely free.

I ended up having to order their sim starter kit because for some reason my Pixel 4a 5g wasn't compatible with their eSim on their Warp 5g(Verizon), which I wanted to try. When I portrs my real number over I did it on their GSM(tmobo) network with eSim and it worked fine. You can get the sim starter kit for free with some promo code they have listed on their site somewhere.

steal_your_face ,
@steal_your_face@lemmy.ml avatar

I use us mobile with two phones and like 30gb each and it’s about $50 total. I’ve had no problems with them and I’ve driven cross country. They are an mvno that runs off Verizon. I def recommend them.

Edit: I still recommend using a provider for home internet. Just cancel everything else besides internet (no home phone or cable tv) and try to find the best deals. I know that’s not easy for a lot of areas though.

Count042 ,

I'm super happy with jmp.chat

I was hesitant to try it, but once I ported my number over, it's the best service I've ever used.

It's $5/month, and your phone calls and texts are forwarded to an XMPP account. Voice mails are transcibed and sent as a text, with the included audiofile. It works over the internet, so you can have multiple phones with the number, and you can use your computer for the service as well.

For data, I use jmp.chats data only esim. It's $7/year + $5/gig but the data never expires.

boaratio ,

I've been a jmp user for years. Love their service.

pelletbucket OP ,
@pelletbucket@lemm.ee avatar

I'm assuming it only works over the internet, right? they're not a cell carrier

boaratio ,

They offer SIM cards, or you can use it with any other carrier. And for the record, I've used visible wireless, mint mobile, cricket, and boost and they all work great. They're just MVNO's that ride on the big 3 carriers networks. Whatever has good coverage in your area will be fine. I haven't used a major carrier in over 10 years.

Count042 ,

That is what the data Sim is for that I mentioned above.

TurdMongler ,

JMP is great! I ported over my number that I've had the longest to them probably 2 years ago when it was still beta. It's so convenient having sms on multiple devices and my computer. I have all calls from jmp forwarded to my phone with service tho. And I just switched that from AT&T prepaid to US mobile.

Edit: I also like popping in to read their group chat. Lots of nerd talk in there.
Also, I'm pretty sure if you ask their support you can still get a free XMPP server with JMP service via Snikket.

___ ,

Visible is wholly owned by VZW, and runs a whole $30/mo inclusive of tax and such.

Best compromise I’ve found between network and not getting screwed or being surprised with outages.

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