# The SBHonline Community Daily > Digerati Discussions! >  >    Verizon iPhone Wireless Hotspot to Cost an Additional $20/Month

## JEK

Verizon iPhone Wireless Hotspot to Cost an Additional $20/Month
Tuesday January 25, 2011 06:16 PM EST; Category: iPhone
Written by arn


Macworld received official word from Verizon about the pricing of the new wireless hotspot feature announced earlier this month.
Raney said that Verizon iPhone owners will be able to take advantage of the 3G wireless hotspot feature for an extra $20 per month on top of the iPhone?s required voice and data plans--that?s the same price that applies to current Verizon smartphone owners.

The wireless hotspot feature allows Verizon iPhone users to share their 3G internet connection over Wi-fi to up to 5 other devices, such as your laptop or iPad. This $20/month fee would be on top of the existing voice and data plans and is said to include 2GB of additional data. 

AT&T presently offers single device tethering for the same cost ($20/mo extra) and is said to be exploring offering the same wireless hotspot tethering. This feature will be included in iOS 4.3, but will be dependent on carriers to provide support for it.

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## Petri

Heh, those folks are eager to charge customers.

Interesting to see if that feature will be disabled for non-AT&T/Verizon phones or something similar, remember the tethering fiasco some time ago.


I pay less than $10/month (6.90e/mo) for the SIM in my MiFi (Huawei E585) device, unlimited data, no restrictions of any kind.  The MiFi unit was £70 and is unlocked so I can drop in a pre-paid SIM abroad and get nice WiFi Internet access for iPad, the ANDROID phone, and the rest  :Big Grin:

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## Peter NJ

Virgin Mobile has a MiFi device as well..No contract..40 bucks a month unlimited..Device is 129.00 I think..

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## Rosemary

We have the Virgin Mobile device.  It works very well.

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## Peter NJ

good to know! nasty rumour says after 2/14 it wont be unlimited anymore..just saw this!

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## Rosemary

Thank you, Peter! That is news to me. We have had four laptops connected at the same time, just zipping along.  We will check this nasty Valentine's Day crackdown rumor.

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## Petri

> Virgin Mobile has a MiFi device as well..No contract..40 bucks a month unlimited..Device is 129.00 I think..



With the ridiculous roaming charges and the planning required to try to avoid them, I like the 3G MiFi device for traveling.  Just buy the local 20 eur pre-paid SIM card and it's usually fine for a week or two's MiFi usage.  Might work in St. Barth, too (unlocked MiFi's are easily available from Ebay UK).  (Virgin Mobile USA uses Sprint's CDMA network so don't try it with that..)

BTW, How's the data speed on the Virgin Mobile/Sprint network?

I believe Virgin's pre-paid options are the best for tourists traveling to the US.

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## Peter NJ

Rosemary will have to answer that..
As far as unlimited the scoop is...well its still unlimited but after you use 5GB during the month,your service will get very slow,or slower..
So its still 40 a month but after 5GB Im guessing it goes to about dial up speed..Or something close to it.This starts on 2/14th.

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## Petri

> Rosemary will have to answer that..
> As far as unlimited the scoop is...well its still unlimited but after you use 5GB during the month,your service will get very slow,or slower..
> So its still 40 a month but after 5GB Im guessing it goes to about dial up speed..Or something close to it.This starts on 2/14th.



One of the carriers here is doing something similar, at 1GB it will slow down to 64 kbit/s unless you order another 1GB with a text message.  They are trying to attract a sweet spot between the 2 Mbit/s and unlimited service of others.

But it's about paying $14/month for unlimited 2Mbit/s or full-speed with slowdown at 1GB (another 1GB is $7), or paying $19/monh for unlimited, full-speed.  For most people the 1GB is enough, average iPhone/Android user uses about 350MB a month.

I got my $10/month unlimited, full-speed due a 24-month contract.  A pity they aren't doing dual carrier HSPA yet, that would be up to 42 Mbit/s down and 11 Mbit/s up.

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## Peter NJ

Yes..forgot to say when you get to 5GB during your month you can either go the rest of your remaining month at those slower speeds or top up with another 40 bucks and get the faster service..

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## Rosemary

Lacking any technical knowledge or vocabulary, I can say it is not fast.

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## NYCFred

Oh, there's an app for that....free, too. 

sorry kids, Android. 

Oh, well.

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## mcginnis67

My Verizon Samsung Fascinate has the Wireless 3G feature and it works great.  Well worth the extra $ when some hotels can charge up to $20 a night for wireless access.

Joe

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## Rosemary

Right now using the Virgin Mobile Mifi in the car and it is working beautifully.  That's great, though I'm told it was brought along to distract me from backseat driving.

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## andynap

I can run hotspot on my Virgin Mobile thru SuperBox app for no cost

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## Peter NJ

Andy the iPhoners will have something snippy to say about that.
Meanwhile our deal for $25 a month is the best one out on the market.

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## JEK

U 2 R swt IMHO

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## Peter NJ

Im not hip enough to understand. :p

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## BBT

I think he meant sweet

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