T-Mobile Makes a Bid for Hardcore Hotspot Users With New 'Go5G' Plans

pcmag.com:

T-Mobile’s rate table looks a little less tidy today with the addition of two unlimited-data plans to the three it already sells. 

The biggest day-to-day difference between the new Go5G and Go5G Plus and T-Mobile’s older, still-available Magenta, Magenta Max, and Essentials plans is mobile-hotspot data allocations. Go5G, $75 a month on a single line, includes 15GB of full-speed mobile-hotspot use, and fills a gap between the 5GB limit on the $70 Magenta and the 40GB cap on the $85 Magenta Max. 

Go5G Plus, $90 a month on a single line, ups the mobile-hotspot cap to 50GB. 

Both new plans also offer more roaming data in Canada and Mexico—10GB on Go5G, 15GB on Go5G Plus—than the 5GB included in Magenta and Magenta Max. Like Magenta Max, Go5G Plus also includes high-speed roaming in 215-plus countries, while Go5G and Magenta limit that to 11 European countries(Opens in a new window) in which T-Mobile’s corporate parent Deutsche Telekom runs networks and offer 2G-spec speeds elsewhere. 

At home, Go5G includes the same 100GB of premium data as Magenta, meaning it can’t be deprioritized during network congestion, and Go5G Plus matches Magenta Max in offering unlimited premium data.

Like the Magenta plans, both new plans offer multiple-line discounts and include taxes and fees in those rates. Go5G drops to $45 a line in a four-line bundle and Go5G Plus drops to $55 per line in the same four-line scenario.

And Go5G Plus throws in a guarantee that subscribers get the same device-upgrade offers as new customers, including the option to change phones every two years.

In an interview Wednesday, Jon Freier, president of T-Mobile’s US Consumer Group, called that feature a response to “contract creep” at AT&T and Verizon, which have