Mint Mobile, recently acquired by T-Mobile, made a big change to its wireless service this week. Those with “unlimited” data plans will truly have unlimited data instead of being capped after hitting a certain data usage threshold.
If that sounds confusing, that’s because it is. Almost every major carrier claims to offer unlimited data to its customers, but some of the heaviest of users that drain more data than most will eventually get cut off. For example, depending on your Mint Mobile plan, you actually only have 40GB of data available each month.
Most customers never reach that number, so the unlimited plan does its job. But for heavy users, once you hit 40GB, you’ll reach a “cap” and run out of data. However, Mint Mobile announced that it’s officially doing away with those data caps, and unlimited data will be unlimited beyond 40GB or whatever it says in the fine print. We’ve seen similar moves as of late from US Cellular and other MVNO carriers.
Mint Mobile’s co-founder confirmed the change, but we’re unsure if it’s live for all users yet. This is likely a behind-the-scenes change, with no action needed by the end user—well, as long as you have an unlimited data plan. According to several users on Reddit, Mint Mobile is sending out messages teasing the change and offering an upgrade to its unlimited plans. The co-founder said, “Existing plans will be upgraded to include this enhancement.”
Unlimited Data (Sort Of)
Unfortunately, we want to clarify that there is still some fine print and limitations you’ll need to be aware of. Just because Mint Mobile is now matching T-Mobile, Verizon, AT&T, etc., with “unlimited data,” you’ll still need to play by its rules. Customers using the most data on Mint Mobile won’t hit that 40GB cap and will be able to use 100GB or more, but it isn’t going to be easy. Like almost every other carrier on the market, the company will slow speeds in certain situations—known as data throttling.
Reading over the Mint Mobile policy notes, it says, “Those who use more than 35GB of data in a monthly billing cycle will have their data usage prioritized below the data usage (including tethering) of other customers at times and at locations where there are competing customer demands for network resources, which may result in slower data speeds.”
For example, once you use a certain amount of data, Mint Mobile may “throttle” and slow down your internet speeds, which will limit your usage. During moments of network congestion (like at a sports event), you may see further throttling. In some cases, carriers will drop the cellular signal down to 3G or a slower 4G connection.
While you technically have unlimited data, and you’ll never hit a data cap, if you use vastly more than the average user you’ll notice times of slower speeds. This isn’t unique to Mint.
Either way, this is good news for Mint Mobile customers and brings it one step closer to bigger service providers. Mint Mobile improved its international roaming options last summer and debuted new plans designed for kids in October. Put your children on an unlimited plan, and don’t worry about overages or data caps again.
Source: Droid-Life
