Normally, Comcast internet plans aren’t the kind of thing we wax lyrical about. But Comcast’s brand-new Xfinity Mobile plans — which run on Verizon’s excellent network — are actually worth considering. You get unlimited data for $45 per month, substantially less than Verizon’s own $80-per-month Unlimited plan (for one user, at least).
Now, there are some catches, most notably that you have to be a Comcast home internet customer to be eligible. But if you’re already suckling on the teat of the beast and you’re not tied into a huge family plan with an existing wireless provider, Xfinity Mobile is worth a look.
The service was first “soft launched” in a handful of markets a few months ago, but as of today, Comcast is rolling it out to everywhere it offers home internet service. There are two plans on offer: the $45-per-month Unlimited, which gets you unlimited talk, text, and data, up to a soft cap of 20GB per month; and the per-GB option, which charges $12 per GB per month.
Comcast is letting you mix and match different types of line on one account, which is unusual for a wireless carrier, and can help make a family plan a lot cheaper. Normally, pricing for Unlimited plans works that the cost per line decreases the more lines you have on the account, but you can’t mix and match different types of lines. It’s designed so that you’ll end up paying for unlimited data for you entire family — even your grandparents who still have an AOL email — since it’s cheaper than doing it line by line.
With Xfinity Mobile, you can pay $45 for any heavy data users in your family, and $25 a month for those who just need a few gigs of data. In theory, it could be a lot cheaper than doing it through T-Mobile or Verzion — and you’re getting Verizon’s excellent network to boot.
