How does unlimited data, unlimited texts, and unlimited calling sound? How does $30 a month sound? How does contract-free and upgrading your phone anytime sound? This is the ultimate guide to the best and cheapest iPhone plan.

The Plan & What You’ll Need

I switched to this plan because it was too good to pass up. It’s best for individuals with just one line. It’s a prepaid plan from T-Mobile ($30/month for unlimited web, unlimited texts, and 100 calling minutes). You may be saying “Whoa Andy, hold up. 100 calling minutes is not enough!”. Here’s where my tech methods (yes I went there) comes into play. I will show you a few tricks you can do to avoid going over the 100 minute limit and basically get unlimited everything. Now I’ll explain how you can get this plan for yourself.

You’ll need the following:

Tip for AT&T iPhone owners: If you already own a GSM AT&T iPhone you have 2 options to unlock it. If you’re 18 months or more into your 2-year contract you can get it unlocked for free from AT&T by submitting an unlock request. If you’re not 18 months into your contract you can get your iPhone unlocked via eBay.

Activating Your New Plan

Once you have your unlocked or contract-free T-Mobile iPhone and the T-Mobile SIM card starter kit, visit this page to start your online activation. It’s a super simple process. T-Mobile walks you through it, hand in hand.

Select the $30/month Unlimited Web & Text and 100 talk minutes plan during activation. You can choose to activate a new phone number or transfer your current number if you have one. If you choose to transfer an existing number, it may take up to 24 hours for the transfer to complete. My number transfer took less than 12 hours.

Bingo! You now have the cheapest iPhone plan. Now what about that 100 talk minutes? Here are some tips to avoid going over that limit.

How to Stay Under 100 Talk Minutes

To stay under the 100 talk minutes limit, you’ll need to make most of your calls over WiFi or your cellular data connection. To do that you’ll first need to:

  1. Sign up for a free Google Voice number
  2. Install the free Google Hangouts iPhone app

Using the Hangouts iPhone app you can make calls to any phone number, and it will use your data connection (WiFi or 4G/LTE) to make the calls. It won’t use any of your voice minutes. Check out this page for details about using the Hangouts app to make calls.

Another way to get around the limit is to use FaceTime Audio if you’re calling another iPhone user. It operates in the same way as the Hangouts app in the sense that it uses your WiFi or cellular data connection to make the calls. See this page for more details.

Now you’re all set up on the cheapest iPhone plan and basically getting unlimited everything! Enjoy your new monthly cash savings. Don’t forget this is prepaid so you’re not under any contract and you can upgrade your phone anytime. Doesn’t get any better than that, folks.

By Andy Slye