Metro by T-Mobile vs Mint Mobile

Plan prices compared

Metro sells month-to-month plans, most priced with AutoPay. Mint sells 3-, 6- and 12-month plans paid up front.

Metro's plan page shows some conflicting figures between plan cards and labels. Confirm the price in checkout before you pay.

Mint's capped plans

If you use little data, Mint's smaller plans are cheaper still. On a 12-month term, Mint lists 5GB at $15/mo, 15GB at $20/mo and 20GB at $25/mo, all paid up front. Metro's plan pages did not show a comparable low-data plan.

Taxes and activation fees

Metro's plan page says sales tax and regulatory fees are included in the monthly plan price. Mint's plans page says taxes and fees are extra, and its labels list a Recovery Fee of $1.54 to $2.58 plus location-based taxes. For how much this can add, see our guide to taxes-included vs. taxes-extra plans.

Metro's homepage lists a $25 per line activation or change fee in its stores and $0 online. Shop online if you can.

Metro's price guarantee

Metro advertises a 5-year price guarantee: it says it won't change the price of talk, text and 5G smartphone data for at least five years. The footnote limits it to customers on an eligible plan and excludes per-use charges, add-ons, third-party services and network management practices. Mint did not advertise a comparable guarantee on the pages checked.

Network and data priority

Both carriers use T-Mobile's network. Mint's help center says it "runs on the T-Mobile network." Metro is a T-Mobile brand, and T-Mobile's network disclosure covers Metro plans directly. Coverage should therefore be close to identical. The difference is how your data is treated when a tower is busy.

Metro

T-Mobile's Open Internet disclosure says data for most T-Mobile-branded plans is prioritized ahead of Metro by T-Mobile plans. It also says Metro customers get higher priority than T-Mobile's heavy data users.

Metro's own plan footnotes add usage thresholds. On the BYOD $25 Unlimited, $40 Period and 3 Months On Us plans, customers using more than 35GB a month "may temporarily notice slower speeds" for the rest of the cycle. On Unlimited 5G, the threshold is 50GB. Metro did not state a threshold for Unlimited Premium 5G, which it markets with premium data.

Mint

Mint's plans page says unlimited customers using over 50GB a month may notice reduced speeds for the rest of the cycle in certain locations when the network is busy. T-Mobile's disclosure does not mention Mint by name, and Mint does not sell a priority tier.

In short, Mint's published threshold is higher than Metro's cheapest unlimited plans. Metro's Premium plan is the only option here that promises premium data. For more on what these thresholds mean, see our guide to data throttling on unlimited plans.

Hotspot

Mint Unlimited includes up to 20GB of hotspot data. Metro's hotspot allowance depends on the plan: 10GB on its $30 Hotspot Included and $35 Mexico & Canada plans, 8GB on Unlimited 5G and 25GB on Unlimited Premium 5G. Metro's $25 BYOD plan and $40 Period plan do not list hotspot.

Metro also notes that smartphone and tablet use is prioritized over hotspot (tethering) use on its network.

For a single line, Mint's 20GB on its $30 annual plan beats any Metro plan under $55. Metro's Premium plan gives more, at a higher price.

Mexico, Canada and international use

Metro

Metro's $35 Mexico & Canada Included plan covers unlimited calls and texts to and from Mexico and Canada, plus up to 5GB of roaming data there. Unlimited Premium 5G includes unlimited texting to more than 210 countries. On other plans, Metro's homepage lists a Mexico & Canada calling add-on at $5 a month. Metro's plan page says international calling and texting are not always included by default.

Mint

Mint includes free calling from the U.S. to Mexico, Canada and the UK on its plans, and free texting to more than 190 destinations. Its roaming page says customers get unlimited talk and text plus 3GB of high-speed data while visiting Canada. For other countries, Mint sells Minternational passes starting at $5 for one day with 1GB of data.

If you travel to Mexico often, Metro's $35 plan is the clearer deal on published terms.

Family and multi-line pricing

This is where Metro pulls well ahead. Its broadband labels post multi-line totals that fall per line as you add lines. These totals exclude AutoPay discounts.

Four lines on $40 Period work out to $25 a line, taxes included. Four lines on Unlimited Premium 5G come to $35 a line with premium data and 25GB of hotspot each.

Mint Family works differently. One primary account holder manages 2 to 5 lines and pays for all of them. Each member picks their own plan and term, and members share savings rather than data. Mint's help page does not list a multi-line discount, so four Mint Unlimited lines on 12-month plans cost 4 x $360 = $1,440 a year, plus taxes.

Who each carrier suits

On documented terms, Mint is the better single-line value if you prepay and use moderate data. Metro wins for families and for anyone who wants monthly billing with taxes included. Since both use T-Mobile, coverage is not the deciding factor here.

For other carriers on the same towers, see our roundup of the best T-Mobile network MVNOs.

Before you switch

1. Confirm your phone is unlocked and works on T-Mobile's network.
2. Get your account number and transfer PIN from your current carrier to keep your number.
3. Activate online if you choose Metro, to avoid the $25 per line store fee.
4. Check the renewal price, not just the intro price, for both carriers.