Cricket Wireless is introducing a new monthly plan that will offer 1GB of LTE data for just $30. The plan will go live tomorrow, September 9th, and will include unlimited talk and text across the U.S. With the major carriers in the country recently unveiling new unlimited data plans, pre-paid carriers are looking for ways to retain their customers by announcing plans that will allow them to remain competitive with the major carriers. The entire chain of events was set in motion last month, when T-Mobile, as part of its ‘Un-carrier 12’ announcement, did away with the traditional tiered data plans by introducing the ‘T-Mobile One’ plan that offers unlimited talk, text and 4G LTE data.
As for Cricket, the carrier will also not charge users for service overages after the data limit is exhausted. Instead, the speed will be reduced to just 128Kbps. The plan, as a whole, is not entirely dissimilar to what Google’s Project Fi offers its customers. The carrier, which is operated by the Mountain View, California-based search giant and works as an MVNO on T-Mobile, Sprint and U.S. Cellular networks, also has a $30 plan that offers 1GB of LTE data along with unlimited talk and text. As a bonus, Project Fi users also get free data coverage in more than 120 countries. Google also prioritizes Wi-Fi connections to reduce mobile data consumption and users are also reimbursed for the amount of allotted data that remains unused every month.
However, even though Project Fi has its obvious advantages over many other carriers in the country, Google has only made the service available to users of just three Nexus smartphones – Nexus 6, Nexus 6P and Nexus 5X. Cricket’s service, on the other hand, is available on a whole host of devices, including the Alcatel IDOL 4, which is currently available at the carrier along with a virtual reality headset for just $199.99. The carrier is also offering a $100 discount on the device for customers switching to Cricket from a competing carrier, meaning, one can realistically expect to get the bundle for a price of only $99.99 in case they’re looking to bring their existing number to Cricket Wireless.