Average cost for a monthly "smart" phone?

[Rico]

Well, my old Sprint contract is up in October and I'm tempted to get a Droid or iPhone.  One of the reasons I've never gotten a phone like this is the monthly cost.  From what I can tell it averages at least $70-80 per month.  Do you get discounts if you have two phones on a plan?  Anyway, I just want some basic browsing ability I think, plus of course voice and text.  Do you think it would be cheaper to just get a hotspot device and use my iPad?  What do you guys pay for these things?  Is 2 GB per month enough for basic browsing?  Anyway, looking for comments and your thoughts.

[spaltor]

I have a Droid (the original) on Verizon, and with NYC taxes, it comes to about $86 per month (voice, data, and texting plans).  This is unlimited data, which will be discontinued soon. 

I've actually been watching my account to see how much data I use on average, since I'll have to choose a new plan on my next upgrade, most likely.  I tend to twitter, facebook, and browse from my phone.  I don't download music to my phone, and I rarely download apps, and I very rarely open email attachments on my phone.  I do, however, tweet and facebook photos from my phone.  At work and home, I connect to a wireless network, so I'm not getting charged for that in the data plan.  Last month, I used 214.15  MB on my data plan, which is about .2 GB.  So, I would say that a 2GB plan is more than enough for simple browsing and email delivery.

And, if you're worried about overage, you can usually set up alerts in your account, so you'll get notifications when you're getting close to your limit each month.

[QuadShot]

We have unlimited through ATT for our iPhones, but from what I heard on the news this morning, ATT will be eliminating that as well. I use my iPhone a lot for browsing, social networking and some NetFlix (more on my iPad now though). I think that 2GIG should be good though.

[Feathers]

I guess my costs are irrelevant but for what it's worth I pay £30 a month although data allowances over here are down to 500MB or so per month (one or two networks may still be higher).

[Dangelus]

It seems to be the case that pricing is fairly universal taking into account the conversion rate, as is the data restrictions!

[KingIsaacLinksr]

Unless your going crazy on data, you should easily stay under 2GBs, 200MBs...eh, you'll have to restrict your data usage to pretty much text only.  No video over 3G, no big downloads and careful of pictures.  And definitely no app downloads. 

I pay $78 right now, thanks to text plans becoming more expensive.  Though if you cut down the data plan and have no texting, you can bring that to....$63?  Depends. 

King

[Dangelus]

I can't believe that operators still get away with charging so much for texts since they virtually cost nothing to send. Ripoff!

[KingIsaacLinksr]

I can't believe that operators still get away with charging so much for texts since they virtually cost nothing to send. Ripoff!

Because we keep saying it's fine.  Until everyone drops Texting, they will continue to charge whatever they feel like.  It is the biggest cash cow in the mobile industry and no company would stop getting easy $$.

King

[Feathers]

As I've said before, it's paying to receive texts that's really alien to me. They'll be charging to receive calls next!

We're off to France next week and I'm debating paying the money to get cheaper roaming (we're still vainly trying to sell the house so I hope someone may want to call) but texts are still free to receive, even in other countries.

Back on topic, I was going to point out that my wife just got an Android device on £15 per month but the data limit there is 250MB. It doe have unlimited text messages though.

[Rico]

Still really seems to be expensive.  So, what's the break for those of us in the US for say two devices from the same company?  Any cost break at all??

[KingIsaacLinksr]

Still really seems to be expensive.  So, what's the break for those of us in the US for say two devices from the same company?  Any cost break at all??

You'll have to ask the company, I have no idea.

King

[X]

Still really seems to be expensive.  So, what's the break for those of us in the US for say two devices from the same company?  Any cost break at all??

Nope, no price breaks really.

[QuadShot]

Well Rico, if you go with ATT, they'll give you one line for $80, or two for $200.  :)  The only reason Joyce and I are with ATT (besides the iPhone), is that we get a 14% discount on cell service, and between 4%-19% discount on Apple products...excluding the new iPhones of course!

[Bromptonboy]

I am paying ~$80US for unlimited data via AT&T - which I don't think is offered any more?  Although I am grandfathered in to that plan.  I don't use too much - so a 2GB limit would be fine for me.

[moyer777]

I'm on Verizon and we have four phones on the plan.  My phone is the main line and cost me like $120 a month, that then shares minutes with all the other phones on my family plan.  Each line after that is $10 plus whatever they want service wise.  We have shared texts and phone time, but if the kids want anything extra, they pay for them.  All in all I pay WAY too much for our phones, but what do you do?  We want to all communicate together, so I don't have much choice.  My data plan is $30 a month and that gets me unlimited data... and I use tons of data.  2 gigs is not enough for me.  At least between our family and anyone on Verizon it doesn't count towards our minutes.. in calling is on my plan for free.