Metro by T-Mobile Continues Price War Started by Total Wireless With New $20 and $30 Unlimited Plans

In late 2024 Verizon’s prepaid value brand Total Wireless launched an aggressive promotion by offering a 50% discount to new customers who brought their own phone. That promotion drops the brand’s $40 Base 5G Unlimited plan to $20 per month and locks the rate in for five years. It also reduces Total’s higher‑tier plans to $25–$30 with AutoPay. The discounts for new customers remain in effect today. Metro by T‑Mobile responded in April 2025 by restructuring its unlimited lineup at $40, $50 and $60 to match Total Wireless's price points and adopt its own five‑year price guarantee. Over the past year Metro has continued to refine its offers and now has BYOD deals that match all of Total Wireless’s discounted single-line unlimited price points.

Metro has long had a $25 unlimited plan for BYOD customers but two other promotions have recently launched to give Metro an unlimited plan at the $20 and $30 price points. The offers are:

• $20/mo BYOD when prepaying six months. Metro quietly launched this deal that lets single‑line BYOD customers prepay six months of service and pay $20 per month for that period. The rate can be renewed at the same price if customers keep the same device and plan. It's available both online and through Metro dealers. Wave7 Research notes there is some signage in stores for this offer, which seems to have launched in February. Some dealers have also been promoting it online.
• New $30 BYOD plan with hotspot. Introduced even more recently, this BYOD‑only plan bundles unlimited talk, text and data with 10 GB of hotspot and carries Metro’s five‑year price guarantee. Pricing drops to $30 per month with AutoPay after the first month, otherwise its $35/month. The plan is for now a web‑exclusive.

The changes show Metro is committed to matching Total’s pricing and to not lose out on potential customers to them. Both brands now offer unlimited plans in the $20–$30 range for single‑line BYOD customers. The primary differences between them are in hotspot allotments, streaming perks, international roaming, and priority data. Total higher-tier plans include priority data, international roaming, and even unlimited hotspot, something Metro lacks.

Comparing Metro and Total BYOD Plans

Metro’s $30 plan directly counters Total’s discounted higher‑tier offer on price, but I guess they hope prospective customers don't notice all the extras Total's plan comes with including priority data, a free Disney+ subscription, international roaming in over 30 countries, and unlimited hotspot. Both brands bake taxes and fees into the advertised prices. Both are also sold online, at Walmart, and in their own branded dealer stores. Total Wireless has been pushing to rapidly open as many stores as possible to help it catch up to Metro.

What About AT&T’s Cricket Wireless or AT&T Prepaid?

AT&T’s prepaid brand Cricket Wireless has not matched the full range of $20–$30 pricing. In May 2025 Cricket introduced a $25/month unlimited BYOD plan sold through Walmart and some dealers, but that offer appears to no longer be available. The plan was essentially a half‑price version of Cricket’s $50 Unlimited plan and included unlimited talk, text and 5G data. What remains now is an unlimited annual plan at the $25/month price point. Cricket does not have unlimited plan offers at the $20 or $30 price points.

AT&T Prepaid also lacks truly unlimited data plan offers at the $20-$30/month price points and has elected to give a half-hearted effort to compete there. Although they are offering "unlimited plans" at the $20 and $25 price points, they are speed capped at 3Mbps and therefore cannot really be compared to Metro and Total Wireless.

Impact on Independent MVNOs

While consumers benefit from lower prices, the price war is squeezing independent MVNOs. BestMVNO has repeatedly reported that carrier‑owned brands are offering unlimited 5G data at rock‑bottom prices while restricting MVNO partners from offering similar truly unlimited plans. MVNOs lease network capacity and are often limited to capped data buckets; they cannot compete with the truly unlimited high‑speed data plans offered by carrier-owned prepaid brands. When Metro, Total, Straight Talk and others sell unlimited data for $20–$30, smaller providers struggle to keep customers and maintain margins.

AT&T may be softening that stance. US Mobile introduced a plan with unlimited 5G priority data on the network last year for $44/month. Promotional pricing has brought the plan down to as low as $24.90/month with an annual plan prepayment. Klarna Mobile announced a truly unlimited 5G plan on AT&T’s network for $40/month as reported by BestMVNO last year, and Sezzle Mobile launched a similar offer starting at $29.99/month. These entrants suggest AT&T is allowing select MVNO partners to offer high‑speed unlimited data, a privilege T‑Mobile and Verizon still reserve for their own prepaid brands.

Editor’s Take

Metro by T‑Mobile’s latest BYOD promotions show just how low carriers are willing to go to protect market share. Total Wireless forced the issue with its half‑price deal, and Metro moved to match it. Cricket and AT&T's half‑hearted offers signal that AT&T is dabbling in the price war but not fully committed. If AT&T continues to grant MVNO partners like US Mobile, Klarna and Sezzle the ability to sell high‑speed unlimited data, they may not need to. For now, consumers shopping for prepaid unlimited plans have unprecedented choices, but they should pay attention to where the plan is sold, whether prepayment or AutoPay is required, and whether the discount disappears if they change devices or switch plans.