Verizon already offers some of the best phone plans in the United States, especially if you need unlimited data and other premium features. If your first priority is saving money, you should take a peek at Verizon’s new prepaid plans.

Verizon has completely overhauled its prepaid plans, making them more competitive with other budget carriers. The cheapest option is now $35 per month, and includes 15 GB of high-speed data and hotspot access — the available hotspot data comes from the same 15 GB pool as the phone. There’s also a $50/mo “Unlimited” plan with 5 GB of dedicated hotspot data. Finally, the $60/mo “Unlimited Plus” option has unlimited phone data, 25 GB of hotspot data, “Global Choice” (which usually costs $10 on its own and has some international access), and support for Verizon’s faster “ultra-wideband” 5G network (which includes C-Band).

A common problem with prepaid plans is that they are often de-prioritized at the network level over premium post-paid plans. For example, if you’re in a crowded sports stadium with thousands of phones in a small area, Verizon’s cell towers are going to prioritize connections from postpaid customers over pre-paid subscribers. That’s not an issue in all areas, but the most expensive Unlimited Plus works around that — the first 50 GB is “premium network access” with no de-prioritization or artificial throttling.

The new plans are overall a better deal than Verizon’s old prepaid offerings, which only provided 5 GB of data for $35/mo, and Unlimited Plus was a whopping $70. However, finding the best pre-paid plan deal might also mean cross-shopping with the plans available from Total by Verizon (previously Total Wireless), which also use Verizon’s network. For example, the base unlimited plan from Total is $10 cheaper than Verizon Prepaid with twice the amount of hotspot data. There’s also Visible, another Verizon subsidiary that offers unlimited plans for as low as $30 per month, and many other prepaid carriers that use T-Mobile or AT&T’s nationwide network.

Source: Verizon