Vodafone UK switches on 5G service, with unlimited data plans

by Mark Tyson on 3 July 2019, 15:41

Tags: Vodafone (LON:VOD)

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HEXUS reported on Vodafone UK's 5G rollout plans back in mid-May. At that time we got to see an outline of its rollout plans which included switch on locations at launch and throughout 2019. Additionally Vodafone shared details about its launch devices which could make the most of 5G connectivity, and announced 5G roaming in four European countries.

Today Vodafone 5G has gone live in Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Glasgow, Manchester, Liverpool and London (and in 27 cities in total across Europe). Formula 1 champion race driver Lewis Hamilton pushed the big red button to active it… Importantly, with the service turned on, we can now look at the prices and plans it is implementing.

No premium for 5G

Vodafone's 5G offering in the UK is said to come without any premium pricing attached. Furthermore, the firm is offering unlimited mobile data plans from £23 pcm. There is a catch, however, in the way Vodafone structures its plans, as you will see in the overview table below.

In brief, to get the most of what 5G is often said to represent you will probably want to choose the 'Unlimited Max' plan which allows your mobile device to connect without any throttling all the time. There looks to be some video/audio streaming service bundling too, however these plans aren't ready to subscribe to until 10th July, for some reason. You can sign up for notifications of the plans going live, if you are interested.

In addition to the above, Vodafone has a couple of 5G phones / contracts available featuring the Samsung Galaxy S10 5G, the Xiaomi Mi MIX 3 5G, and the (Huawei) Vodafone 5G GigaCube router. If you follow that router link you will see a sextet of 5G home broadband options available. From the trio of 18 month contract options, unlimited 5G data costs £50pcm, a 200GB allowance costs £40pcm, and a 100GB allowance is £30pcm. You will also face an upfront cost varying from £50 to £100 with these contracts - to help pay the router cost I guess. The 30-day contracts all come with a one-off fee of £325 for the router, and then the data charges are the same as the 18-month offerings but you can opt in and out very easily month to month.

Vodafone is making some other tweaks and changes to its mobile and broadband offerings today. Firstly, it is said to be simplifying its Red plans from 10th July. Secondly, the new Vodafone Together plans combine unlimited mobile plans and home broadband in one deal, on one bill, all managed from the My Vodafone App. For example customers can get Unlimited Max and Vodafone Superfast Broadband 1 plus a free Amazon Echo Plus for £50pcm, extra family lines come with a 15 per cent discount.

HEXUS recently reported upon EE's 5G launch, EE's 5G mobile broadband plans, and Three's 5G launch plans for August - if you want to get up to speed with UK 5G service. The other member of the 'big 4', O2, hasn't released any 5G news recently, but we know it plans to roll out its 5G services before the summer is out.



HEXUS Forums :: 10 Comments

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£26 a month for 10mbps. i get 70mbps on their 4g, all be it only 8gb of it.
Did someone mis a 0 off those speeds. 5G at 3G speeds in limited areas and same price as 4G
Think i'll pass
Does anyone else get reminded of the IT crowd with the internet in a box?

Don't drop the internet!

He pressed the big red button to turn on the internet. Wow. Well done Lewis. It would have been better if you'd got your dog to do it.
PC-LAD
£26 a month for 10mbps. i get 70mbps on their 4g, all be it only 8gb of it.

Out in the relative sticks with mediocre 4G I get around 6mb/s down and 12mb/s up on Vodafone 4G. So I'd not really want to cap that at 2mb/s and I certainly won't be paying more for 10mb/s given that's the max speed I can expect. I'd want to see what “unlimited” actually does before I go paying for it. I'd probably want a demo / free trial before I shell out that amount. £30 / month for the plan and then the phone on top. So that's a Samsung 5G model then? Let's see…. shall we be very generous and say the phone might be a grand? 24 month contract = £42 / month. Plus £30.

This is no gauntlet. This is two plans which are probably slower than the existing stuff and another which is an utter nightmare. The upside is unlimited data but I'm sure there will be a strict fair use policy and on top of that that'll probably end with your contract never to return as people transition to 5G as standard and the network gets saturated.

Am I talking rubbish here? Please tell me if I am because I can't see this being great value. Sure there are definitely people who will want it but you're going to really struggle to tempt me when I can't even get 3G, never mind 4G when sat on the pan at work.
philehidiot
Out in the relative sticks with mediocre 4G I get around 6mb/s down and 12mb/s up on Vodafone 4G. So I'd not really want to cap that at 2mb/s and I certainly won't be paying more for 10mb/s given that's the max speed I can expect. I'd want to see what “unlimited” actually does before I go paying for it. I'd probably want a demo / free trial before I shell out that amount. £30 / month for the plan and then the phone on top. So that's a Samsung 5G model then? Let's see…. shall we be very generous and say the phone might be a grand? 24 month contract = £42 / month. Plus £30.

This is no gauntlet. This is two plans which are probably slower than the existing stuff and another which is an utter nightmare. The upside is unlimited data but I'm sure there will be a strict fair use policy and on top of that that'll probably end with your contract never to return as people transition to 5G as standard and the network gets saturated.

Am I talking rubbish here? Please tell me if I am because I can't see this being great value. Sure there are definitely people who will want it but you're going to really struggle to tempt me when I can't even get 3G, never mind 4G when sat on the pan at work.
I keep getting notified that you are quoting me! Rubbish tapa talk app!

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