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Google Fi Unlimited Plan
- cryptofits 7y agoI used Google Fi last month when I traveled in Turkey-Russia I was surprised by how good this service is and by how fast google support answered when I had some questions They should open it to more countries and not only for U.S citizens
- merb 7y agoare you real or is google now that far with AI?
- shanecoin 7y agoGoogle Fi is the only provider that I know of to best protect against SIM swapping due to the fact that there is no human interface. An attacker would have to get control of you Google account in order to attack you—if this happens it is likely you have bigger issues than SIM swapping. Given Jack Dorsey's recent Sim swapping experience coupled with countless cryptocurrency SIM swapping horror stories, it feels like Google Fi is necessary. The only negative thing I have heard about Google Fi is the requirement to pay per GB. This point is now moot.
- briffle 7y agoIn my state, their coverage is pretty bad if you spend any time in the outdoors. Comparing the coverage of google-fi and verzion and att on highways through the mountains, its very stark. I'm also curious how they will fare when 2 of their 3 MVNO providers merge (sprint and tmobile)
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- cptskippy 7y agoEventually service will improve. Presently Sprint and T-Mobile both dedicate spectrum to the same thing. They have to reserve some spectrum for legacy applications while optimizing for newer technologies. By combining their spectrum they might be able to reduce the aggregate spectrum necessary for legacy applications and better utilize spectrum fro newer technologies.
- Dylan16807 7y agoAvoiding overlaps helps with bandwidth. I don't know if it will help with coverage.
- jsjohnst 7y agoIt might help with coverage as they aren’t needing 2x as many towers to cover the same area, thus potentially justifying adding towers in new places, but I wouldn’t hold my breath on that happening in any broad way.
- nuclear_eclipse 7y agoMeanwhile, my work phone on AT&T has some of the worst LTE coverage imaginable around town in the bay area - constantly without a meaningful data connection - while my wife's identical phone on Google Fi is almost never below fell bars, and her data connection is rock solid.
- sixothree 7y agoI've yet to hear anything good about the coverage in my city - New Orleans.
- kube-system 7y agoMy only concern with that is -- what if you actually need human support?
- imgabe 7y agoThey do have human support. I've called it when my phone unexpectedly bricked itself and after jumping through a few support hoops, they sent me a new one. It was not a bad experience.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- arunmib 7y agoInterestingly their human support has been good, considering how annoying and not helpful human support is with other Google services.
- sliken 7y agoI've had a few problems with my family plan and my parents. All resolved pretty quickly via chat. I'd much rather have a bit of lag/latency of chat than listening to that awful hold music with periodic "We appreciate you patience" that always triggers me to think the wait if over. The chat folks seem much better than most, none of the crap where they don't understand and just waste your time. They had to the power to change my account, fix problems, and gasp actually got back to me.
- bvandewalle 7y agoThe only issue is that it is Google. I use Google Fi outside the country and put the plan back in pause while I'm in the US. I'm very satisfied with them but don't trust Google enough to switch my main number.
- justhw 7y agoBingo! They could "sunset" Fi on a whim when they get bored. Plus Google's poor record of customer service or rather AI Bot customer service - is what will keep away me from trying it.
- dannyr 7y ago"Poor record" is actually not my experience. Customer service with Fi and Google Store is pretty excellent. A lot of people in my network also have the same good experience.
- Schnitz 7y agoFi customer service is actually excellent. First level support is actually knowledgeable and trying to help you, as opposed to just being a wall trying to prevent you from reaching second level support. Also the wait times have never been more than 2-3 minutes for me.
- windthrown 7y agoLike the other comments noted, in my experience Fi support has been quite helpful and significantly better than standard Google support.
- 1shooner 7y agoI've been on Fi for 4 years, and it has been a very flexible, positive experience vs. the alternatives at that time. Even if they were to sunset it, I don't particularly see the risk; I would just change to another service.
- _eht 7y ago>Talk to a human anytime Whenever you have questions, talk or chat 24/7 with real, friendly people who are ready to help. Source: the website
- Sodman 7y agoInteresting distinction between the new unlimited plan and the old one: "On the Fi Flexible plan, video streams at 1080p (Full HD quality). On the Fi Unlimited plan, video may be streamed at 480p (DVD quality)."
- ISL 7y agoIf the internet is a dumb pipe, how does it know whether you're streaming video and at what rate?
- tantalor 7y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_of_service https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_of_service
- bvandewalle 7y agoWhen you are Google, the internet is not a dumb pipe. For example they can correlate the youtube videos you are watching from your phone.
- mostvexing 7y agoDoesn't this violate net neutrality?
- kelnos 7y agoWhat net neutrality? And even when net neutrality rules were on the books, companies still got away with stuff like this.
- james-mcelwain 7y agoWhat net neutrality? Net neutrality was repealed over a year ago.
- Dylan16807 7y agoIn a minor way. The neutral alternative would be a system that allows bursting but then caps everything down to about 1.5Mbps. They're not really trying to discriminate between types of data, they're trying to lower the 95th percentile.
- thorwasdfasdf 7y agousmobile.com is much more cost effective. I can get an unlimited minutes/text plan, plus 5GB/month for 25$ there, 30$ (with all the taxes and fees).
- rb808 7y agoI always really expected Google Fi to be cheap and good. Its relatively expensive though, I'm surprised people choose to use it. MVNOs are getting really cheap now like $15, even big 4 telcos (3 of them!) prepaid are like 20-30/mo
- sdenton4 7y agoHuh, I find the price quite good. I have two people on the flexible plan, $15/mo + $10/GB, which typically comes to $35-50 a month. Previously we were on t mobile and paying like $90 a month baseline (including add on for travel flexibility, which is free on Fi), and sometimes getting to $110 or so.
- rb808 7y agoYeah travel is the main benefit. FYI ATT prepaid is $25/mo for an 8GB plan https://www.att.com/prepaid/ https://www.att.com/prepaid/. Mint is $15/mo for 3GB https://www.mintmobile.com/product/12-month-small-sim-card-plan/ https://www.mintmobile.com/product/12-month-small-sim-card-p...
- ram_rar 7y agoGoogle Fi is expensive for individuals. Their initial premise was $20 base for unlimited text/phone and $10 / Gb. It was very naive of me to think that my avg phone bill would decrease a lot. But the data streaming adds up. You are better off in a group plan (unlimited data) with friends on TMobile. it ll cost you lot less.
- chronic71819 7y ago> Google Fi is expensive for individuals. Their initial premise was $20 base for unlimited text/phone and $10 / Gb. Pixel 3 user here. I pay $30/month on average. What on Earth are you torrenting on your phone? I've never used more than 5 GB data in a month. Just wait till you're back on wifi before watching YouTube...
- ARandomerDude 7y agoCompletely agree. I work from home and I rarely user over 1GB. It's very cheap for me.
- leet 7y agoBut Tmobile family plan costs you $30/month with unlimited data. I think it is crazy that we have to pay $10/ GB for data specially when I am traveling around the country with no wifi.
- JoshTriplett 7y agoI use Google Fi, and I don't think unlimited data is the headline feature here. If you look at the fine print on the existing "flexible" plan (search for "that’s a max bill of"), they already cap the maximum data cost; comparing the cap to the Fi Unlimited price, Fi Unlimited saves you very little, in exchange for never letting you pay less if you use less data. Based on that, and the fact that I rarely hit the cap, it isn't worth switching. However, Google Fi Unlimited also gives unlimited international calls to many countries. That might make it worth switching, at least for months I'm traveling.
- tetra_proxy 7y agoIt does give you another 7 gigs of data before they start to throttle your data.
- bpchaps 7y agoGoogle fi user here: when they throttle in areas with weak cell signal, the throttling is aggressive and internet practically doesn't work. It's very frustrating. "Throttling" isn't the right word.. maybe "crippling" is better.
- joecool1029 7y ago> when they throttle in areas with weak cell signal, the throttling is aggressive and internet practically doesn't work. I want to add in for those that don't know. There's a difference between throttling and deprioritization. Throttling usually kicks in as some specified speed at the IP network's level(like 256kbps). This isn't going to make a difference whether you're close to a tower or far away. It will make a massive difference on your battery life if your user equipment has to stay transmitting forever to complete transfers (this is a big problem when roaming on t-mobile's throttled international plans, battery life is obliterated). Deprioritization is very different. The radio layer (called radio access network) of the tower (specifically the sector) that you're connected to controls how much time your device gets using a QoS scheduler. Stuff like voice always takes priority no matter what, since it all goes over the same data network now. I'm going to try to explain this below in easier to comprehend language... In LTE, resources can be allocated out to a device as resource blocks. Each layer allows up to 100 physical resource blocks at any given time. Depending on the quality of the signal (how far away you are and how many people are using it), the blocks can be broadcast at different MCS levels. This controls the amount of error correction and the amount of data that can be carried per resource block. So when you're stuck at cell fringes and only allowed to get less than 5 resource blocks at an instant, the transfer rates will be slow. When you're close and allowed to use higher orders of modulation with less error correction (256QAM broadcast 4x4 MIMO), the performance loss isn't going to be as noticeable. Deprioritization can be worked around by connecting to a different sector that isn't as busy. It's also assessed pretty quickly, something like 20ms the radio scheduling happens. Sprint's the only network afaik that posts something even slightly technical to the general public: https://www.sprint.com/en/legal/open-internet-information.html https://www.sprint.com/en/legal/open-internet-information.ht...
- Rainymood 7y agoHow long before they kill this?
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- bovermyer 7y agoWhen I switched to Google Fi, my phone bill dropped from $140 a month (Verizon, two people) to $60 a month (1 person), including the monthly finance charge for my phone. Now, with two people and no phone financing, our bill is a combined $80 a month most months. I don't see why I'd use this Unlimited plan, given that it's much more expensive. Also, unrelated: Google Fi has been amazing when travelling abroad (Dominican Republic and Thailand, specifically). Full signal and no added charges everywhere there. Sadly, my wife and I are planning to go back to Verizon just to get iPhones.
- JoshTriplett 7y ago> Sadly, my wife and I are planning to go back to Verizon just to get iPhones. Fi supports iPhones somewhat. The coverage isn't quite as good, due to lack of support for using multiple networks simultaneously, but it works.
- saghm 7y agoFWIW, I get better coverage with just T-Mobile on my OnePlus 6T than I did from Sprint/T-Mobile when I was on a Pixel phone; I generally had to manually switch the credit carrier whenever it selected Sprint because it was basically unusable due to how slow it was.
- tdewitt 7y agoMy phone is a Walmart special $30/no but my wife, on Fi, spends the max (~$90). She streams music for our kid, while driving. Dropping her to $70/mo is a win for me. Obviously everyone is different but I just wanted to point out the per person cap in a normal plan can be higher than the unlimited. I converted her over yesterday.
- sliken 7y agoIf you have youtube red google will download the 500 most common songs to your phone, which really helps minimize the bandwidth for streaming audio. You can even edit playlists on the desktop and play those playlists on the car. Said playlist will auto download to your phone.
- dougmwne 7y agoFirstly, I'm not sure what the magic is on this service within the USA now that T-Mobile and Sprint are merging. That was the original premise, that Fi would allow you to blend multiple phone networks for better service. It would be awesome if they managed to bring on another of the carriers and US mobile doesn't count for most of the US. Having said that, the international roaming is the best offer that I know of from a US provider and I could easily see it being worth it for anyone who travels often. They also just added free calling to 50 countries on this unlimited plan, so that's also a great bonus if you work internationally often.
- smoovb 7y agoWith the ease of adding a roaming eSIM, there is not much need to worry about origin of international roaming plans. You can get an eSIM2Fly (Thailand) or Three (Hong Kong) eSIM for roaming in all of Asia for under $5 per GB.
- big_chungus 7y agoThis is just an "I'm curious" question. Can any one who uses lots of data detail for what it is used? I never use more than 300 megs per month. Browsing the occasional web page is fun, but I've always gotten most of my big files off-line before I went somewhere. I don't do streaming media, so that's probably part of it, too.
- tehlike 7y agoAutomatic uploads of photos and videos, some youtube music, some streaming, some hotspotting. Didnt realize but washington post seem to be downloading a lot too. I am on corporate phone plan, and probably more than half of my data is work related videos and photos (robotics, people love videos lol).
- infecto 7y agoI would guess that's all of it. Streaming video, music, even apps like instagram I imagine make up for the largest chunk of data.
- vgrafe 7y agoI use google maps a lot. When I walk around, when I drive (1hour commute/day). Also use spotify (but most of the time offline-saved tracks). Twitter/internet browsing in waiting rooms. I consume on average 3 to 4 gigs a month.
- twiceaday 7y agoYouTube and Twitch every day on public transportation.
- scarejunba 7y agoI never use wi-fi, travel a lot with lots of photos and sharing/viewing videos on Instagram, and have instant backups for everything.
- bt848 7y agoI have Android Auto in my car and virtually all of the data usage is Music. I think it would be really nice if they would try to pre-load music that I'm likely yo enjoy when the phone is connected to my home wifi network, instead of always streaming over mobile. The other day I drove for 2.5 hours and it used 300MB of data. I wasn't even listening to music the whole way.
- yalogin 7y agoI am probably concerned unnecessarily here but I am worried about providing all data from my phone to Google like this. I know they are probably already getting every bit of data from my phone through their ad network but I would like them to at least make the effort to get my data rather than me paying and giving it to them. I know its silly given that I am already giving it my current carrier, may be its better to just give it to Google as they already have my data and not giving it to the carrier will cut out one copy of my data.
- exabrial 7y ago> Video may stream at DVD-quality (480p). How do they manage that over TLS?
- Avery3R 7y agoIt's not just video, it's based on IPs. https://fast.com https://fast.com will show a slow speed too
- sp332 7y agoThey throttle video so that the client switches to a lower bitrate version of the video. You can still identify video streams even if they are encrypted, or being Google they might just have a big list of IPs as Avery3R mentioned.
- exabrial 7y agoThanks.
- NullPrefix 7y ago>High-speed data up to 22 GB/person & slower after That's not really unlimited.
- s09dfhks 7y agoJust switched from googleFi to xinfinty. They offer unlimited for $50 for a single line. I was a bit worried about leaving Fi since I had an upcoming trip to Europe since they offer the "built in roaming" but it really wasnt an issue
- longstation 7y agoI am using mint. Not trying to compare it with Google Fi because it offers only the basic features: text, voice and data (no fancy features like international roaming). But when people say they cut down a lot on phone bills, I want to point out that I spend only $15 on my phone bill, $30 for the entire family (two people).
- drtz 7y agoPurely anecdotal, but my experience with Fi has been far less than ideal and I'm about ready to switch to another network. Right now I'm about a week into fighting with support, so far unsuccessfully, to get back $40 in charges for device protection on a device that was deactivated months ago. Their response: "it's your duty to remove device protection when deactivating a device." This is after more than a year of struggling with WiFi tethering issues. I've had a ton of problems with the hotspot dropping WiFi connections and other weird networking problems where the phone suddenly stops routing traffic correctly (I suspect it's something to do with the network swap). In the ~10 times I've contacted them about the issue, support has been absolutely terrible. They usually take about 30 minutes before they even figure out what tethering is, only to suggest I install OS updates or swap out my phone for the nth time.
- jdm2212 7y agoThe device protection seems like it should be separate from the phone plan though? Unless the device protection is voided by canceling your service, it makes sense to not cancel those charges. You might deactivate the device and take it to another provider but still want it fixed if it breaks, right?
- adrianmonk 7y agoYou could want that, but it's not the common case. Therefore, to me it sounds like something they should ask about when you deactivate service, and they should either have no default (force you to explicitly choose) or default it to canceling the device protection.
- fossuser 7y agoI've been pretty happy with Visible which is a Verizon owned MVNO (sort of, not sure if it's a true MVNO if Verizon owns them). Everything is done via an app, you get the Verizon network with unlimited LTE (though you do get de-prioritized during congestion, but I've found it to be fine in the bay area). It's $40/month which includes all local fees/taxes and it's no contract. Only downside is no cellular support for the Apple Watch.
- julienchastang 7y agoSlightly off topic. I’ve been looking to get a Moto G6, a phone available through the Google Fi store ($99), but it is permanently “out of stock”. I assume this is on purpose as Google wants you to purchase a more expensive phone — a bit of a bait and switch. Anyway I did manage to get a “blush” version of the phone yesterday, which is now again out-of-stock. I’ve been waiting to get the black version of the phone with no luck. I even registered to be notified for availability but that evidently does not work since they never notified us concerning the "blush" version of the Moto G6.
- rasengan 7y ago22GB unlimited and then slower after.
- throwaway5752 7y agoTing is just great. So funny to see TUCOWS - "The Ultimate Collection Of Winsock Software" from decades ago - morphed into its current form. Great example of the moat from exceptional customer service, I wouldn't even consider Fi for a second, outside of a trying it out on a secondary device.
- gok 7y agoIt remains frustrating that no provider offers a plan which more accurately reflects how the cell network functions. When your local cells is not near full load, downstream bandwidth should cost nothing over your fixed monthly access fee. When the network is busy, they should auction off high speed access (call that "surge data"). From a UI perspective this would have have been hard to do pre-smartphone but nowadays it would be pretty straight-forward. The desire for these "easy to understand" data plans instead results in really inefficient network operation. Throughput collapses in busy areas during business hours even if you pay for the super mega ultra unlimited plan, because everyone is using their "unthrottled" data. Meanwhile if off-peak usage were more discounted (say, $0.10/GB instead of $10/GB) many people would probably be able to give up their home internet service.
- dehrmann 7y ago> It remains frustrating that no provider offers a plan which more accurately reflects how the cell network functions. This is one of my gripes with net neutrality, mostly on cell networks. It ignores how the network operates and that saturating a link at 3AM is different that 5PM. > From a UI perspective this...would be pretty straight-forward. Not really. "You're about to stream a video. Tap to accept the 15 cent network surge fee."
- ocdtrekkie 7y agoWhen cell plans commonly had night and weekend minutes, people didn't need to accept the charges each time. This is a ridiculous interpretation. But say, people might schedule their Steam downloader to only update games in off-peak hours. And apps might have features that cache content automatically during off peak to save their users money.
- cameronbrown 7y ago> But say, people might schedule their Steam downloader to only update games in off-peak hours. Thus making off-peak hours perpetually on-peak?
- jrockway 7y ago> Video may stream at DVD-quality (480p). So much for net neutrality. How far Google has come.
- kempbellt 7y agoI hate this kind of advertising. It is bullshit and I am tired of it. In GIANT BOLD: $50 In smaller font: "each" In even smaller font: "$150/mo" is finally explained "High-speed data up to 22 GB/person & slower after." is not unlimited data when the "slower after" speeds can barely load google's search page. It is, 'high-speed data up to 22 GB/person & slower after". Do we need to start throwing around a dictionary definition of the word unlimited? This is getting old... Just because it's google, doesn't mean they get a pass on car-salesman type sleazy sales tactics. Why not just advertise it plainly? This method of advertising makes someone like me less likely to buy this product.
- scblock 7y agoYep. Looks like garbage to me. Someday "unlimited" will mean it, but right now it's just code for "actually quite limited but written in small print." I'll pass.
- ratsimihah 7y agoUnlimited used to mean unlimited.
- mikeash 7y agoNow it means “caveat emptor.”
- tempodox 7y agoThat's true and practically every statement made in an ad aimed at the general public should be taken with just as many buckets full of salt grains. If an ad for a lab oscilloscope were made that way, nobody would ever buy it.
- dboreham 7y agoIn a marketing context it never meant that, same as "satisfaction guaranteed" doesn't mean what you expect. It really means "product has a fixed price with vendor defined service level" vs "defined service level and variable price according to usage". "Unmetered" might be a reasonable shorthand.
- ehosca 7y agoFi is a science fair project
- bobbles 7y agoFor unlimited data with included international data... shouldnt I be able to sign up for this internationally and essentially get unlimited usage in my own country? For example my phone plan costs over $100AUD so that I can get a measly 1GB of international roaming data.. this seems like it would be a better option?
- paxys 7y agoUnlimited data even when roaming internationally is a game changer. Definitely worth $70/mo for people who travel frequently.
- sarego 7y agoI bought my wife's phone bundled with Fi with interest free installments. However since I had to activate the phone itself using her email id the installments never happened they charged me the amount all together. I called support but they didn't help/ didn't know how to. I have never had to call them since then which helps. I myself have a republic connection which IMHO opinion is very similar and has a very similar plan getting bandwidth from different carriers to operate. Republic is much better for some reason in terms of coverage and is cheaper as well. Overall I am appalled by the cost of mobile data and internet in the USA compared to countries like India. Reliance JIO just changed the game in India with the unlimited data and every other provider was forced to up their game. Not seeing anything like that happening here.
- the_mitsuhiko 7y agoI find this “unlimited” meaning 22GB very ridiculous.
- sliken 7y agoWhy? You binge several seasons of TV through your phone. You exceed 22GB... you click on youtube/netflix/whatever and it... works. If you keep asking for data... they keep sending it. Sounds unlimited to me.
- the_mitsuhiko 7y agoI use north of 50GB. A lot of this is from tethering. Since I have more data than I need I don’t feel much restraint from using my phone productive for work. A lot of the data comes from software updates etc.
- diffeomorphism 7y agoIt doesn't work. If you rent a car and it says "unlimited mileage. Speed reduced to 3 mph after the first 10 miles". The car keeps driving, it is "unlimited" but useless for normal usage. Netflix and youtube will simply not work (buffering for 5 seconds every 3 seconds is not working), but you can keep using it for "whatever"* (*maybe, sometimes, for the first 10 days).
- sliken 7y agoDVD quality is hardly 3 MPH. DVD quality is more like unlimited miles you can only do the speed limit. Using a phone with "only" DVD quality streaming video is still perfectly usable. Sure it's not HD quality, but if you are streaming over 22TB a month a small decrease and video quality isn't a big deal. How much are you going to see on a small phone screen anyways?
- diffeomorphism 7y agoWhat? No, you don't get DVD quality. They say that while still under 22GB you might get only DVD quality (fine. I don't care). After that you are throttled.
- stove 7y agoGoogle Fi has been amazing as a "digital nomad". Show up in country X and have a working phone with 4g/LTE + ability to tether. Local sim cards are cheaper, but you can't beat the ease of use. Conversely, I've noticed that my cell service is significantly better (call quality, coverage, etc.) abroad than it is in the SF Bay Area.
- objektif 7y agoHave you tried Tmobile for international travel? I wonder how it compares. I belive it is cheaper than this plan.
- umeshunni 7y agoT-Mobile limits you to 128/256kbps in international roaming. That worked great when it was introduced but nowadays I find that most apps are barely functional at 128kbps. While roaming, I want at least my messaging, mapping and email apps to work and everything else can wait till on WiFi. Even FB messenger and Google maps struggle at that.
- fitzroy 7y agoCompletely agree. I used Sprint's 128kbps roaming and it's better than nothing, but so many basic things just won't load. iMessage and Google Maps were decent (particularly if you download the map for offline). What doesn't get mentioned enough is that 128/256kbps roaming absolutely kills your battery because the phone's radio has to stay on so much longer.
- copperx 7y ago> ability to tether In a different thread, people were complaining that Google Fi doesn't let you tether while roaming. Is that false? Or is it just a limitation for certain phones?
- dannyr 7y agoI had 0 problems tethering using Google Fi.
- aabajian 7y ago"Let Google Fi enhance your network. Get more privacy and more security. Your mobile and Wi-Fi data is sent through Google Fi's Virtual Private Network (VPN). Get fewer connection interruptions by automatically connecting to mobile data when Wi-Fi is poor. appears in the status bar when the VPN is active. The Google Fi VPN increases data usage by about 10%. You can turn this off in Fi Network Tools in the Google Fi app."
- justhw 7y agoI've been meaning to try Google Fi for a while but I'm sitting on the fence too long. The fact that they could "sunset" Fi on a whim when they get bored with it and lack of good customer service since it's not Adwords bothers me enough not to try.
- apapap 7y agoI need to switch from At&t to google Fi because of sim swapping.
- asc123 7y agoAnyone have experience with this? I heard the service is atrocious on iPhones at least.
- vagab0nd 7y agoAnecdotal only, but in the 15 years that I've used cell phones, I was never once unable to make a phone call when I had full signal bars. That is, until I switched to Google Fi on my Pixel XL 2. After the switch, I was constantly missing calls and messages. And needless to say, download speed was abysmal. Tried customer support, swapping SIMs, resetting phone, and all that, to no avail. Switched back to Verizon after a month and never looked back.
- fnord77 7y agoAre they losing money on the service and somehow making it back from data harvesting (either directly or indirectly by selling more google phones)?
- Arelius 7y agoI'd like to point out that at the 256kbps throttle, you can actually only download about 80GB of data in a month. Add on the 22 GB pre throttling, and you get just over 100GB/mo hard cap. Really doesn't sounds like "unlimited" to me.
- nickthemagicman 7y agoGoogle fi unlimited 70$ for 22 gigz Verizon unlimited 100$ bucks for 75 gig
- Schnitz 7y agoThis is a disappointment. I've been a Fi customer since the early days, but the last year or so I was mostly just staying on Fi because I was hoping they'd announce better pricing. Everything uses so much more data than 3 years ago now, which has made Fi more and more expensive. Is there still any way to get the T-Mobile $30 Walmart plan? I now regret giving that plan up for Fi, because today where you easily need 2+GB of data every month it's a much better deal, it even offered 2G data internationally (enough for WhatsApp, maps, etc). I'll be looking for Fi alternatives now that I know to not expect better pricing.
- uptown 7y agoVerizon prepaid works well for me: https://www.verizonwireless.com/prepaid/ https://www.verizonwireless.com/prepaid/
- techntoke 7y agoGoogle has some issue where you're not eligible for Google if you have a secondary Google Voice number. What is up with that?
- morpheuskafka 7y agoSo $70/month for 22 GB of data with mandatory video throttling? This isn't newsworthy or a good deal.
- leric 7y agoIncluding China? Really?
- microcolonel 7y agoThe fact that they take the roaming boot off your neck is worth it on its own. Even if it's "faux unlimited", their roaming agreement is sooooooooooooo good, if it is as it seems to be described. Not really sure why anyone would stream video at more than 480p on a phone, and I have no idea how they could implement that anywhere except YouTube and maybe a couple partners (Netflix?) but that may be worth trying the Flexible plan, which is still pretty great for roaming.
- nikolay 7y agoGoogle Fi is a no-go for me as they make me lose my Google Voice number. Currently, I'm on the old T-Mobile One plan with One Plus International for $25/mo, which gives me unlimited Hot Spot and LTE data plus a lot more. Unfortunately, the knuckleheads at T-Mo discontinued it, so, now they have almost no competitive advantage.
- elamje 7y agoNot that huge of a headline due to them already having a form of unlimited. This saves some pennies if you go over that cap consistently. However, I commend the Fi team for working out the details for international travelers. I used it for a 20+ country, Asia/Europe trip with 0 complaints. China/Russia/Thailand/etc....always just worked! Very amazing, and probably saved me hundreds from avoiding those scammy airport SIM cards everywhere.
- lysp 7y agoIn Australia one of the major Telcos got taken to court by the competition watchdog. They were advertising plans as "unlimited" with shaping. The court found that the advertising was misleading and were unable to continue advertising it. If Fi was released as advertised in Australia it'd also most likely be found as misleading advertising and not allowed. https://www.computerworld.com.au/article/376550/optus_loses_unlimited_broadband_dispute/ https://www.computerworld.com.au/article/376550/optus_loses_...
- Animats 7y ago"Unlimited", ha! If the FTC wasn't out to lunch, they'd hammer on Google for false advertising. Sonic.net sells unlimited bidirectional gigabit fiber. And they're profitable. Why can't Google do it? Their only limitation is: "Operation of servers for commercial purposes by non-Enterprise customers. Note that it is acceptable to use servers for private or personal use (such as servers to access content in your home and applications that have server capabilities such as multiplayer gaming) and for small business customers to operate private (in-profile) servers for business purposes."
- dheera 7y agoTruly unlimited exists in the fiber world, but I'm not aware of any truly unlimited LTE plans. Considering Google Fi is an MVNO they are unlikely to be able to offer something that the carriers they use don't offer. I agree with you though, it's false advertising. They should all be fined and banned from falsely using the world "unlimited".
- pishpash 7y agoWhy is this on HN? This is an ad with no new information. (Capped plan existed for a long time.)
- garysahota93 7y agoI wish they had better support for iPhones...
- smsm42 7y agoIt looks not spectacular but OK, but I would never switch my main phone there for one reason - it's not their core business. They could decide to kill it any moment. Even though it's not too hard to switch, it's not worth the hassle. If it were half-price of other plans, maybe, but it's roughly the same, maybe different features a bit.
- nikanj 7y agoDoes anyone know why the signup process stalls for me ( https://imgur.com/a/Ato8rDq https://imgur.com/a/Ato8rDq )? I hate sites that just disable the "Next"-button without any explanation
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- jbarham 7y agoI'm surprised how expensive this is. In Australia I pay A$25/month (around US$17) for unlimited talk & SMS and 18 GB of fast 4G data: https://www.aldimobile.com.au/plans/value-packs/ https://www.aldimobile.com.au/plans/value-packs/.
- risfriend 7y agoWow, being in India this cost is enterprise level. Its super costly. You can get ~42 GB (1.4 GB per day limit) data for around 400 INR, thats 6 USD per month.
- rataata_jr 7y agoThanks to Jio for shaking the market.
- blueblisters 7y agoI was just thinking about how long that party is going to last. I am not sure service providers can sustain this much longer without tapping into revenue from upstream value add (streaming, advertisements etc.)
- Uptrenda 7y agogoogle is your portal to the web, your way to filter information, your point for offline communication.. and online communication. soon to be the infrastructure it runs on. thats just way too much access to personal information for one company. just wow
- projectileboy 7y agoI’m very interested in the plan as it’s written. The main reason I wouldn’t switch to this from T-Mobile is that I honestly never know when Google will decide to just say, “welp, we got bored with this, so we’re taking our ball and going home - good luck switching back!” Aside from GMail getting slower and the search results containing more ads, I don’t feel like you can really count on Google to stick with anything.