AT&T is making its off-contract GoPhone plans a little more competitive as T-Mobile continues its aggressive tactics to win over customers in that market. Beginning next Friday, AT&T will make changes to two of its prepaid GoPhone plans: most notably, its $60 per month plan will now include an extra 500MB of data, bringing it up to 2.5GB per month, and begin allowing customers to use their data to create Wi-Fi hotspots; its second change will double the data offered in its $40 per month plan from 250MB to 500MB per month. AT&T will also debut a plan sold only at Walmart that includes 1GB of data and unlimited talk for $45 per month.
AT&T adds more data and tethering to top prepaid plan
is The Verge’s executive editor. He has covered tech, policy, and online creators for over a decade.
AT&T’s GoPhone plans have been steadily improving, with the biggest change being the addition of LTE service last May. Since then, T-Mobile has been doggedly pursuing off-contract customers — particularly those of AT&T. While T-Mobile’s a far smaller carrier and it’s hard to say how much success it’s had there, AT&T seems to be paying some attention anyway. Of course, adding support for tethering — the ability to create Wi-Fi hotspots — really just means that AT&T is finally letting some of its GoPhone customers better take advantage of the data they’re already paying for rather than arbitrarily charging more for that privilege, but it’s a big perk nonetheless and makes the top GoPhone plan an increasingly appealing choice for those looking to stay off contract.
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