Why Sling TV is an essential part of a balanced cord-cutting diet

Sling TV has gone through multiple evolutions since it debuted at CES 2015 (winning our Best in Show award in the process). Since then, it’s become an ever-present option for the cord-cutting crowd looking for live TV without the bonds of cable, but the service’s multiple options have made it increasingly complicated.

More: Sling TV vs. PlayStation Vue vs. DirecTV Now vs. YouTube TV: Live TV streaming showdown

To help simplify everything Sling has to offer (it’s a lot!), we’ve put together a comprehensive, hands-on evaluation so you can see if it’s right for you. (Note: If you’re here to catch up on the latest channel additions, scroll down to page 2 below.)

Sling TV: What it is and isn’t     

Dish Network would still be happy to sell you 250 channels for $85 per month, and it doesn’t intend Sling TV to replace full-blown satellite service or cable. Instead, it hopes to meet the needs of so-called cord-cutters (those who quit cable) or cord-nevers (those who never had it), who can’t get everything they want from traditional streaming sites like Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu. That’s what makes Sling TV’s inclusion of sports networks like ESPN and NFL Network so attractive – live streaming sports are hard to come by outside of a contract.

Sling TV’s selection of channels was lean to start, but it’s starting to beef up, and the channels it does offer (listed below) are fairly popular. The service also offers video-on-demand from a handful of the channels it offers, as well as movie rentals. Best of all, Sling TV requires no sign-up fee, no contract, and you can test it out with a one-week free trial before fully diving in.

Single stream vs. multiple streams, time shifting, and more

There are some important asterisks. First, only certain subscription packages allow for multiple simultaneous streams. If you opt for the basic package, Sling Orange, you’ll be restricted to streaming from just one device at a time. You can easily jump from your tablet to your streaming set-top box, for instance, but you can’t use both at the same time. The other, more expensive subscription plans allow for up to three simultaneous streams. Also, many channels don’t allow time shifting; that means no pausing, rewinding or fast-forward. (We’ve outlined which channels do allow time shifting below.)

Why Sling TV is an essential part of a balanced cord-cutting diet

Sling TV has gone through multiple evolutions since it debuted at CES 2015 (winning our Best in Show award in the process). Since then, it’s become an ever-present option for the cord-cutting crowd looking for live TV without the bonds of cable, but the service’s multiple options have made it increasingly complicated.

More: Sling TV vs. PlayStation Vue vs. DirecTV Now vs. YouTube TV: Live TV streaming showdown

To help simplify everything Sling has to offer (it’s a lot!), we’ve put together a comprehensive, hands-on evaluation so you can see if it’s right for you. (Note: If you’re here to catch up on the latest channel additions, scroll down to page 2 below.)

Sling TV: What it is and isn’t     

Dish Network would still be happy to sell you 250 channels for $85 per month, and it doesn’t intend Sling TV to replace full-blown satellite service or cable. Instead, it hopes to meet the needs of so-called cord-cutters (those who quit cable) or cord-nevers (those who never had it), who can’t get everything they want from traditional streaming sites like Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu. That’s what makes Sling TV’s inclusion of sports networks like ESPN and NFL Network so attractive – live streaming sports are hard to come by outside of a contract.

Sling TV’s selection of channels was lean to start, but it’s starting to beef up, and the channels it does offer (listed below) are fairly popular. The service also offers video-on-demand from a handful of the channels it offers, as well as movie rentals. Best of all, Sling TV requires no sign-up fee, no contract, and you can test it out with a one-week free trial before fully diving in.

Single stream vs. multiple streams, time shifting, and more

There are some important asterisks. First, only certain subscription packages allow for multiple simultaneous streams. If you opt for the basic package, Sling Orange, you’ll be restricted to streaming from just one device at a time. You can easily jump from your tablet to your streaming set-top box, for instance, but you can’t use both at the same time. The other, more expensive subscription plans allow for up to three simultaneous streams. Also, many channels don’t allow time shifting; that means no pausing, rewinding or fast-forward. (We’ve outlined which channels do allow time shifting below.)

Vodafone scraps roaming charges to 40 countries

Why it matters to you

Vodafone’s decision to zap roaming fees in certain countries could spur its competitors into doing the same.

If you’re a Vodafone customer, good news: You’ll no longer have to pay roaming charges in dozens of countries around the globe, though centering on Europe. On Wednesday, the carrier announced that it was doing away with roaming fees in 40 countries.

“Our customers make it clear to us that they wanted the freedom to use their phones worry-free while abroad and we have listened,” Vodafone U.K. commercial director Glafkos Persianis said last year.

The full list of newly fee-free countries includes Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia, Bulgaria, the Channel Islands, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, the French West Indies, Germany, Gibraltar, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Isle of Man, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, the Republic of Ireland, Romania, San Marino, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Turkey.

Those are in addition to Vodafone’s 60 “roam-further” locations, which let customers take advantage of domestic data, call, and text rates for a 5-pound fee.

The news follows the introduction of new Vodafone plans: Essentials, Red Extra, and Red Entertainment. Essentials starts at 9.50 British pounds per month (on a 12-month contract) for 250 minutes, unlimited texts, and 250MB of data. Red Extra bumps that up to unlimited minutes, texts, and 2GB of data for 18 pounds, or 4GB of data for 22 pounds per month. And the top-of-the-line Red Unlimited comes with 8GB of data for 27 pounds per month, 20GB for 35 pounds per month, or 40GB for 40 pounds per month.

More:  How to dodge roaming fees and still stay connected abroad

The move is conspicuously timed to coincide with the European Union’s rollback of roaming charges. In roughly two months, mobile carriers will be legally obligated to charge the same phone, text, and data rates across the continent. In addition, they’ll be bound to net neutrality rules that will require them to treat all internet traffic equally and ensure a minimum internet quality for “special services” — meaning those that require higher bandwidth — provided it doesn’t impact normal internet use for others.

The new rules aren’t perfect. A fair use policy would prohibit customers from registering and paying for a phone in a country where they don’t live, then using it at home to save money. EU carriers reserve the right to “impose minimal surcharges,” if it can be proved that the new system threatens to raise prices on domestic contracts and services. And networks can restrict or block internet traffic to protect against cyber-attacks or manage speed “for commercial reasons.”

But it’s the first step toward cheaper roaming across the EU. The cost caps are 3.2 euro cents per minute for calls, 1 euro cent for SMS, and 7.7 euros per gigabyte of data. They’ll gradually be reduced over the coming years, eventually reaching 2.5 euros per gigabyte at the beginning of 2022.

Supreme Court of India rules to shut down cell tower after man’s cancer claim

Why it matters to you

While it’s doubtful this will set any global precedent, building future cell towers in India may become more problematic.

Can radio signals from a cell tower cause cancer? The Supreme Court of India seems to think so. In a unique case, the court ruled to shut down a cell tower after a man alleged that radiation from the tower is the cause of his cancer.

The man, Harish Chand Tiwari, approached India’s apex court — the country’s largest court — about the tower in 2016. The tower was owned and operated by Indian telecom operator Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL). According to Tiwari, the tower was illegally installed on his friend’s roof — which happened to be less than 50 meters away from his house. Tiwari says he was exposed to “radiation” for 14 years — which he suggests is what afflicted him with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma.

“We direct that the particular mobile tower shall be deactivated by BSNL within seven days from today,” said Justices Ranjan Gogoi and Navin Sinha, according to the Times of India. This tower will be the first to close based on an individual petition alleging harmful radiation.

It’s important to note a few things. Despite numerous scientific studies, cell towers have yet to be proven to be the cause of any kind of cancer or other illness. Still, many refute the studies, and citizens in India have even attempted to block the installation of cell towers in their neighborhood, according to Mashable. India’s IT and Communications Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad even had to address the concerns himself.

“Mobile towers are not harmful! Doesn’t America have mobile towers? Doesn’t Europe have mobile towers? There [sic] tele-density is much higher than in India. This planned campaign against [installation of] mobile towers is totally uncalled for,” Prasad said in a statement.

This case does set a precedent, at least in India and it will be interesting to see if more people follow up with similar claims.

The Oppo R11’s specs were just leaked online, showing 4GB of RAM and a 5.5-inch display

Why it matters to you

Looking for a new midrange phone? Oppo could be prepping a new device for launch within the next two months.

Oppo could be prepping another phone to be released in the near future — and it could be a pretty darn powerful one. A series of specs related to the phone have leaked online, showing that the Oppo R11 could be the first Oppo device with a dual rear-facing camera. According to the leak, that camera will weigh in at 15-megapixels.

The leaked specs come in the form of a GFXBench log, which was published on SlashLeaks, and they show some pretty nice elements beyond just the camera.

For example, the device has a Qualcomm-built octa-core processor, which may well be the Qualcomm Snapdragon 660. On top of that, however, the phone will feature 4GB of RAM and 64GB of built-in storage. It will also feature Android 7.1, the latest and great version of Google’s Android.

The front-facing camera appears to be pretty high-tech, too. According to the specs, it will sit in at 19 megapixels. Along with that, the phone will feature a 5.5-inch 1,080p display — but rumors indicate that a “Plus” version will expand that screen to around 6 inches. Rumors also indicate that the phone will launch at some point in June.

As far as design goes, we’ll have to wait and see what the phone ends up looking like. The device has yet to be leaked in any photos.

Oppo is having quite a year. The company recently launched the F3 Plus, which was generally well received — although it wasn’t perfect. One of our main complaints was that it featured an older version of Android. If the leaked specs for the R11 are to be believed, it seems that Oppo has learned from that mistake. Perhaps the coolest thing about the F3 Plus, however, was its dual front-facing camera — something that we’ll likely see on more phones as time goes on.

We’ll keep this story updated as we hear more about the upcoming Oppo R11.

Microsoft test suggests that using the Edge browser will yield better battery life

Why it matters to you

According to a recent test, using the Edge browser in the Windows 10 Creators Update can make your battery last a bit longer than other browsers.

The Windows 10 Creators Update that was just released brings a number of new features and improvements to the operating system. It’s not just the OS, however, that Microsoft spent some time improving, but also some of the first-party apps that go along with it — with the Edge browser being a highlight.

While Edge received its own helping of new features, it appears that Microsoft also spent considerable time improving its underlying performance. The company has been touting Edge’s advantage in power efficiency for a while now, and it published some additional results to back up its claim that Edge can help you work longer without a charge.

Specifically, Microsoft took a look at browser efficiency when running fullscreen Vimeo video following the installation of Creators Update. Tests were run on three Surface Books running Windows 10 build 15063, measuring how long it took for them to completely run down the battery when running a Vimeo streaming video in Edge, Chrome 57, and Firefox 52.

Although the results are necessarily limited by the scope of the testing, they’re still impressive. The Surface Book running Edge lasted 751 minutes before running out of steam, while the machines running Chrome and Firefox lasted for 557 and 424 minutes, respectively. That means that Edge held out for 77 percent longer than Firefox and 35 percent longer than Chrome.

The Surface Books used in the tests were equipped with Intel Core i5-6300 CPUs and 8GB of RAM, and were running with the Intel HD Graphics 520 GPU. The machines were on the same wireless network with display brightness set at 75 percent and a number of options disabled. The tests therefore not only highlight the efficiency of Microsoft’s Edge browser, but they also provide a hint as to how to optimize a Surface Book for the best battery life.

In the end, we’d expect a test that Microsoft publishes to favor its own Edge browser. But these results are nothing new — Edge has clearly been engineered to save some battery life over competitive browsers. Going forward, we’ll need to see if Edge can maintain its advantage as more power-sucking extensions are implemented and more people start using Edge on different machines.

AMD Ryzen 5 1600X CPU overclocked to 5.9GHz with all threads enabled

Why it matters to you

If you have a high-end cooling solution, AMD’s Ryzen CPUs can offer big overclocking potential.

It turns out that with the right cooling AMD’s new Ryzen CPUs can be overclocked very well indeed. Although 4GHz tends to be the rough barrier for air cooled Ryzen CPUs, one overclocker has given a Ryzen 5 1600X processor a bath in liquid nitrogen and with that cryogenic fluid in place, he was able to clock it as high as 5.9GHz without disabling any cores.

One of the commonplace tricks to raise a processor’s clock speed is to disable other cores and threads. When the CPU only has to make calculations with one or a few of its cores, it doesn’t have to work so hard and therefore doesn’t require as powerful a cooling solution. That’s what makes this AMD Ryzen overclock so impressive, because the person behind it kept the chip running in a stock configuration, at anything but stock clocks.

The overclocker in this instances was OC expert and YouTuber der8auer, who went to an Asus testing facility in Taiwan in February to test out Ryzen CPUs and see what they are capable of. While he admits that some of the records he broke there have since been beaten by other overclockers, the Ryzen 5 six-core, 12-thread record stands.

More: Intel’s Core i7-7700K CPU reached 7.3GHz using liquid nitrogen and liquid helium

The final clock achieved was 5,905Mhz and he has the HWBot results and CPUZ validation to prove it (thanks Hexus).

As well as the raw clock speed record for the Ryzen 5 1600X CPU, der8auer also managed to achieve records for six core CPUs in GPUPI for CPU, Cinebench R11.5 and GeekBench3. Each of those records has a reasonable lead over the number two spot, but most impressive in this case is that every other member of the top 10 in each of those categories is an Intel CPU.

It’s also interesting to note that those scores were achieved at lower frequencies than the runner-up Intel chips. Later on in the above video, der8auer highlights how in some cases the weaker-scoring Intel chips were clocked as much as 700MHz higher than the Ryzen 1600X which took the top spot.

der8auer

Other hardware used for test runs included an Asus ROG Crosshair VI Hero X370 motherboard running a BIOS from February 8, 2017, G.Skill Trident Z DDR4 RAM and a 128GB Samsung solid state drive. All benchmarks were run on Windows 10 64bit.

Also of note was der8auer’s praise of the Ryzen physical architecture when it comes to cryogenic cooling. By having the pins on the CPU itself (PGA) rather than on the motherboard (LGA), he said there was much better contact between the cooler and the processor.

You can ‘Learn What’s Next’ at Microsoft’s upcoming May event

Why it matters to you

If you’ve been wondering what Microsoft will be doing next, then you won’t want to miss out on this event.

With yesterday’s release of Windows 10 Creators Update, right now would seem the perfect time for Microsoft to announce something new. Apparently, the company agrees, and it’s done just that with a typically vague announcement of an upcoming event in New York City on May 2, 2017.

Titled “Learn What’s Next,” the event will likely be welcome news to anyone who’s been wondering how Microsoft will follow up its latest major Windows 10 release. All sorts of rumors are flying around about Microsoft’s Surface hardware line and the next Windows 10 build, and now we finally have an idea of when the company might provide some enlightenment.

Of course, the announcement doesn’t tell us anything about what Microsoft might be planning to discuss. The #MicrosoftEDU hashtag, however, implies that we might see something of interest to the educational market, which aligns with recent rumors that Microsoft plans to talk more about the low-cost Windows Cloud effort that seems tailor-made for cost-conscious educational customers and will likely combat Google’s Chromebook initiative in that market.

Furthermore, the event comes less than two weeks before Microsoft’s Build 2017, which is where the company will reveal important facts about its software strategy. This raises the very real question of whether Microsoft will announce new hardware on May 2, and what that hardware might include.

Some recent information suggests that Microsoft will not announce the much-anticipated Surface Book 2 and that a Surface Pro 5 might or might not be revealed. Anyone who’s been waiting impatiently for more information on the next Surface machines might therefore be disappointed.

In any event, at least some questions are likely to be answered. If you’re not able to make the event in person, then you’ll be able to attend the live-stream in the comfort of your own home or office. The event will take place at 9:30 a.m. ET on May 2, 2017, and Microsoft provided a handy link if you want to go ahead and add the event to your calendar.

Burger King’s new Whopper ad forces Google Home to read you ingredients

Why it matters to you

Burger King’s ad could signal the beginning of a worrisome trend: Commercials that trigger smart home assistants.

Arguably one of the Google Assistant’s best features is the ability to respond hands-free. On Google’s Home speaker and supported smartphones, shouting, “OK Google” wakes Google’s artificial intelligence-powered service in a jiffy. But as Google Assistant users who watched a new ad spot from Burger King recently found out, that convenience can be a curse.

The 15-second advertisement features an actor standing next to a television and a Google Home. “You’re watching a 15-second Burger King ad, which is unfortunately not enough time to explain all the fresh ingredients in the Whopper sandwich,” he says. “But I got an idea. OK Google, what is the Whopper burger?” The Google Home, prompted by the phrase “OK Google,” recites the Wikipedia entry for Burger King’s whopper.

The campaign hasn’t gone as smoothly as planned. On Wednesday, pranksters amended the Whopper’s list of ingredients to include “100 percent rat,” “toenail clippings” and less publishable foodstuff. (As of publication time, Wikipedia’s editors seem to have wrested control of the page.)

It Google doesn’t appear to have been complicit in Burger King’s ad. As of Wednesday afternoon, Google Home no longer responds to the commercial’s voice command.

Despite the kinks, Burger King’s ad is an inventive — if audacious — marketing ploy and one of the first to specifically target the growing segment consumers who use computer-powered assistants at home.

TV commercials have historically triggered assistants unintentionally and often to comedic effect. During the 2017 Super Bowl, Google’s ad for Google Home set off speakers when actors used the phrase, “OK Google.” Earlier in 2017, a San Diego station’s story about a six-year-old girl who bought a dollhouse with Amazon’s Echo speaker, a competing home assistant, set off Echo devices when the command was repeated on air.

“With the onset of consumers buying intelligent system devices and using them at home, we thought this was a good way to make a connection and go directly to guests and tell a story about our product,” José Cil, president of Burger King, told The New York Times. “We think about our guests’ perception and their perspective on how we interact with them, but on balance we felt this was a really positive way to connect with them.”

Past experiments with assistant-powered promotions have not been well-received. In February, Google Home users complained about hearing an audio promotion for Disney’s Beauty and the Beast movie as part of My Day, a collation of weather forecasts, commute updates, calendar appointments, and news. Google later clarified that the promotion wasn’t intended to be an ad and that it would “[continue] to experiment with new ways to surface content for users and […] do better.”

But Burger King sees Google Home and other smart speakers as an opportunity to make an impact. The ad airs live Wednesday night on MTV, Bravo, and late-night shows starring Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon.

Complete List of Verizon MVNOs

If you like Verizon’s coverage but not its prices, check out an MVNO.

A mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) is an “alternative carrier” that leases coverage from one of the “Big Four” carriers (Verizon, Sprint, AT&T, and T-Mobile) and sells it for less. If one of the Big Four has excellent coverage in your area, but you’re looking for something a little cheaper, then consider going with an MVNO.

There aren’t too many MVNOs that are powered by Verizon’s network, so you need to make sure your phone will work with them before switching over (if you plan on bringing your own device). There biggest thing to look out for is if your phone supports CDMA service. Many MVNOs offer network checkers to help you figure out if your phone will work or not.

To work on Verizon-based alternative carriers, your phone must support the following frequencies:

• 3G: 800Mhz (BC0), 1900Mhz (BC1) 1
• LTE: 700Mhz (Band 13), 1700/2100Mhz (Band 4), 1900Mhz (Band 2)

1 Phone must support bands on CDMA.

Without further ado, here are the MVNOs that are powered by Verizon.

• Affinity Cellular
• Armed Force Mobile
• Boom Mobile
• Credo
• Eco Mobile
• Expo Mobile
• Net10 Wireless
• Page Plus Cellular
• Puppy Wireless
• Red Pocket Mobile
• ROK Mobile
• Selectel Wireless
• Straight Talk
• Total Wireless
• TracFone
• Zing PCS

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Affinity Cellular

Affinity Cellular is an Iowa-based carrier that operates primarily on the basis of awarding members of various clubs discounts on cell phone service. The biggest club to which it offers discounts is the American Automobile Association (AAA). In fact, if you sign up for a contract, you receive five AAA dollars.

On its “About Us” page, Affinity states that it aims to serve those people who “depend on the benefits and security a cell phone provides but certainly are not using it every minute of every day.”

Plans start at $10/month for 10 voice minutes, $1.50/month for 100 texts, or $1/month for 50 texts and 5MB of data.

Affinity’s “unlimited plan” is 5000 texts, 5000 minutes, and 5GB of data for $45/month, so if you’re a regular smartphone user, you’ll probably want to look at another carrier.

Learn more

Armed Forces Mobile

Armed Forces Mobile is all about supporting veterans. A portion of all proceeds go to Operation Support Our Veterans, a nonprofit based in San Diego that is focused on supporting other organizations that help American vets with PTSD and injured veterans, as well as through direct donations.

If supporting the American military is a cause that’s near and dear to your heart, then this is the carrier for you.

Plans start at $35/month for 1GB of 4G LTE data, unlimited talk, text, and 2G data.

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Boom Mobile

Boom mobile’s network is powered by every member of the Big Four, though the AT&T network is only available to business customers. That being said, on T-Mobile, Sprint, and Verizon’s networks, you’re getting pretty great coverage with Boom Mobile.

If you have a large family, Boom is the carrier to go with, with family plans allowing up to 10 lines.

All that being said, Boom’s family plans only use the T-Mobile and Sprint networks. Verizon’s network is used for prepaid, non-data plans that feature unlimited talk and text. You can only use CDMA-compatible devices with these plans and MMS (video and picture messaging) is unavailable. There is a prepaid plan that offers 2GB of 4G LTE for $35/month, which is on Verizon’s network, but the Boom plans that use the T-Mobile and Sprint networks are better value.

Boom’s prices are comparable to other better MVNOs, so unless you need up to 10 lines on your family plan, you might want to look elsewhere.

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Credo Mobile

Credo is a major player in the MVNO market, operating as a division of Working Assets. Working Assets has been around in various iterations since 1985, with a core tenet of helping nonprofits through donations. Credo operated as Working Assets Wireless, changing to Credo in 2007 and only started using the Verizon network in 2016.

The aptly named Credo operates in the name of social change and has since its inception. It maintains a strict environmental policy, offering free phone recycling and it prints bills on 100% post-consumer recycled paper. It also uses carbonfund.org’s “carbon free” program to offset its electricity and shipping costs.

Basically, if you want to support social change and a carrier with an immense sense of social responsibility, then Credo is an awesome choice. You even get to vote on which organizations get donations — organizations like Planned Parenthood, Bend the Arc, the Indigenous Environmental Network, and more.

Plans start at $30/month for 1GB of 4G LTE, unlimited talk and text, and tethering. There’s also a “line fee” for each device you use (you can share your data among devices). It’s $20 for smartphones, so you’re actually looking at $50/month for 1GB of data.

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Eco Mobile

Eco Mobile’s main squeeze is the Sprint, but it uses T-Mobile to fill in the empty spots and Verizon for CDMA service. Eco’s a great carrier if you’re looking for great rates on international calling, with unlimited international calling available for free on plans of $30/month and up.

Plans start at $20 for unlimited talk, text, and 100MB of data. 2GB of data, unlimited talk, text, 2G data, and international calling is $30/month. All plans get voicemail, caller ID, call waiting, three-way calling, MMS (picture and video messaging), and domestic calling.

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Expo Mobile

Expo really pushes the whole “bring your own device” thing, which is great, especially if you’re just coming straight from Verizon, since CDMA devices are compatible.

Expo offers 30-day plans that require no contracts, as well as pay as you go plans, which range from 90 days to 365 days. You pay between $10 and $100, depending on your term, and then pay 2 cents per minute or message, and 5 cents per MB of data on the 120 day plan or longer.

30-day data plans start at $35/month for unlimited talk and text and 500MB of 4G LTE. After your allotment, you’re throttled to 64kbps, which is slower than 2G.

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Net10 Wireless

Net10, owned by TracFone, uses all of the Big Four’s towers to help with coverage, which means you get solid coverage for a little less than you’d spend going with one of the biggies. The nice thing is that, because Net10 uses everyone, you get to bring pretty much any phone you have — just know that if your phone isn’t CDMA-compatible, then it likely won’t connect to Verizon’s network when you use Net10.

All smartphone plans come with unlimited talk, text, and 2G data. $35/month gets you 500MB of 4G LTE, but an extra $5/month gets you 3GB, and you can save $4/month if you sign up for Auto-Refill.

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Page Plus Cellular

Page Plus is a pretty run-of-the-mill MVNO operating on Verizon’s network. Plans start off very inexpensively, at $12/month for 250 minutes, 250 texts, and 10MB of data. If you’re a realistic user, then you’ll want the $40/month plan that features unlimited domestic calling, $10 of international calling credit, unlimited global text, and 3GB of 4G LTE.

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Puppy Wireless

Puppy Wireless’ logo features a little spaniel pup with headphones in, shaking its head. It’s adorable, and Puppy Wireless knows this — who doesn’t love puppies?! Its website is rather confusing, since you pick your plan based on your coverage and the color-coded network. So you enter your zip and then get your choice of networks. It would definitely be way more convenient just to pick from a list of plans and have the carrier put you on the right network, no?

Simple, budget plans start at $7.95/month and offer 50 minutes, 50 texts (no video or picture messaging), and 5MB of data. 4G LTE plans starts at $35/month for 3GB of 4G LTE. It’s unclear as to whether or not unlimited talk and text is included with the $35 plan.

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Red Pocket Mobile

Red Pocket uses all of the big carriers, so you’d really only choose to use Verizon with them if you have a CDMA-only device, like a flip phone. If you’re using a GSM-capable phone, then you’d likely choose a GSM SIM and get better speeds and coverage.

Red Pocket has two basic plans to choose from and you can add to the second. The first plan is $10/month and gets you 500 minutes, 500 texts, and 100MB of 4G LTE. You can then buy extra texts, minutes, and LTE. The second plan is $19/month and gets you unlimited talk and text, with 100MB of 4G LTE. You can upgrade to unlimited 2G data with 500MB, 1GB, 3GB, or 5GB of 4G LTE for $6 to $41/month.

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ROK Mobile

ROK Mobile is for folks looking for life insurance with their cell phone plan. I know those things seem mutually exclusive, but if you’re not covered through work and you’re already paying a monthly charge to some insurance company, why not have it on your monthly phone bill or get a little extra?

Plans range from $5/month to $50/month, with the $50 plan being the only one that features data. You get roadside assistance, $100,000 accidental death insurance, $20,000 in burial and cremation insurance, family legal services, ID theft insurance, pharmacy savings, and telemedicine. Oh, yeah, and you get unlimited talk and text and 5GB of 4G LTE.

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Selectel Wireless

Selectel is another relatively run-of-the-mill MVNO. You get plans for as low as $15/month, which includes 300 minutes, 300 texts, and 15MB of data. $30/month gets you 1GB of 4G LTE, unlimited texting (not video and picture messaging), and 1500 domestic calling minutes.

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Straight Talk

Straight Talk is owned by TracFone and is that cell phone section you see at Walmart. It features the latest phones and lets you bring your own device, since it uses all four of the big networks for coverage.

Plans start at $30/month for 1500 minutes, unlimited texts, and 100MB of data. $45/month gets you 5GB of 4G LTE and unlimited talk and text, as well as unlimited 2G data.

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Total Wireless

Total Wireless is another TracFone-owned carrier that offers average MVNO rates for data plans. Its cheapest data plan is $35/month for unlimited talk and text and 5GB of 4G LTE. A great add-on feature is 3GB of 4G LTE for $10, and if you don’t use that extra 3GB up by the end of your month, you can carry it over to your next billing month.

Total’s family plans share data, and you can get up to 15GB of data for 4 lines to share for $100/month. Not bad at all.

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TracFone

TracFone has been around since 1996 and owns multiple MVNOs, which it operates on various networks.

Its cheapest data plan with a gig or more is $17.50/month for 1GB of 4G LTE, 750 minutes, and 1000 text, BUT you have to sign up for a 60-day term, so that 1GB has to last you 2 months. An extra gig of data is $10, which expires at the end of your term.

TracFone is perfect for folks who constantly travel to the U.S. and don’t want to buy a local SIM or pay outrageous roaming fees.

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Zing PCS

Zing PCS or Zing wireless is an MVNO with decent prices and a website that looks like it was made in 1999. Data plans start at $28.99/month for 1GB of 4G LTE, unlimited talk and text, unlimited international text (picture and video messaging not included), and unlimited 2G data.

Zing also supports and provides service for Lifeline, the FCC program that helps make communication services more affordable to low-income individuals and families.

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