Mobile Network Comparison

We’ve posted up yet another review of a brand-new virtual network. Our Delight Mobile review looks in detail at their slightly confusing pricing model and runs the calculations to conclude that they are actually one of the lowest-priced PAYG networks in the UK. They have very competitive prices for texts and calls as well as some of the lowest rates for data, voicemail and MMS and great offers too. We also analysed the link with Vectone, looked at the company history and discussed the network coverage in the UK. Go check out the full review yourself and feel free to rate them yourself or leave a comment.

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Giffgaff have unveiled a surprise this week – long-awaited data roaming! The announcement only came out yesterday that it activation would begin today, Thursday 28 July, ready for going live on Friday 29 July. Finally Giffgaff users can use internet data on their smartphones whilst abroad.

But not so fast, data-fiends. First, be sure to check out the pricing rates:

• Data roaming in any EU country (also including Andorra, Croatia, Faroe Islands, Gibraltar, Iceland, Kosovo, Liechtenstein, Monaco, Montenegro, Norway, San Marino, Serbia, Switzerland, Vatican City) will cost you £1.50 per MB.
• Data roaming in any other country (including United States, Australia, India and China) is prices at £5.00 per MB.

All data charging is done to the nearest penny which means that you will pay 1p for roughly 7 KB inside Europe and roughly 2 KB everywhere else.

To prevent your phone using data unintentionally, it’s a good idea to switch off data roaming when you’re not using it. To do that on Android, simply hit Menu on a Home Screen and navigate to Settings > Wireless & networks > Mobile networks and uncheck Data roaming. On iOS go to Settings > General > Network and slide Data Roaming off. It’s also worth saving money by trying to minimise use of data-intensive apps like YouTube, Spotify or other streaming services and app stores. Also, use mobile versions of website and don’t leave data apps running in the background accidentally.

If you’re abroad and on Giffgaff, please make a note of these rates to avoid running up a massive phone bill when this is activated at 00:00 BST on Friday morning.

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At the beginning of the month, Giffgaff finally started charging for mobile data. Because their pricing structure is quite complicated, we whipped up a handy graph to show how much it costs you to use PAYG data on Giffgaff:

Lots of people seemed to find this graph really useful but wanted to have a bit more context. Even more useful than knowing how much Giffgaff charge for data would be a comparative diagram showing how much all the mobile networks charge. So we went back to our spreadsheets and whipped up the following:

This is a graph showing the basic PAYG rates for data on all the main UK networks. With this, you can clearly see which networks are good value and which are rip-offs. And best of all, if you know your rough monthly usage, you can estimate how much mobile data is going to cost you on any network.

We’ve kept it as the basic tariff to allow for a fair comparison – of course, many networks have special booster deals for internet usage. Also, some networks even offer unlimited data but, bear in mind that even more don’t have truly all-you-can-eat mobile data offers.

As always, please leave any comments, corrections and suggestions in the comments below.

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