Just a few months ago Verizon's CFO Fram Shammo shouted:
"You cannot make money on an unlimited video world............At the end of the day, people don't need unlimited plans." ((Cnet))
It seems Fram Shammo is eating his words, as Verizon has decided to indeed go ahead and launch an unlimited data plan. The plan officially launches on Monday, February 13th at 6 am EST.
Pricing for the plan will be $80 for a single line and those with a family or group of 4 will pay just $45 per line. Each additional line beyond 4 will cost $20 per line for up to 10 lines. Customers must agree to auto pay and paper free billing in order to subscribe to the plan, which is a much easier requirement to fulfill compared to AT&T's ludicrous requirement of a DirecTV subscription for an unlimited data plan.
Like the 3 other major wireless carriers, Verizon will also prioritize the speed of its unlimited data plan customers below other customers on the network once they consume a certain amount of data in a month. Verizon's data prioritization will kick in after 22 GB of high speed data has been consumed which is on par with AT&T, but below T-Mobile which offers 28 GB and Sprint which offers 23 GB before prioritization. Data prioritization of course means that those who go over the high speed data threshold will see their speeds temporarily slowed during times of heavy network congestion so as to not affect the user experience of other customers.
Aside from having the nations largest LTE network, the Verizon unlimited plan has an advantage over competing plans from Sprint and T-Mobile as video's will stream at a resolution of 720p compared to 480p from T-Mobile and Sprint.
Those that have good network coverage with Sprint, may find their latest promotion which offers 1 line of unlimited data for $50 and $90 total for up to 5 lines to be the best unlimited deal around. T-Mobile is charging $70 for one line, and $160 for 4.
You can see how Verizon's latest offering of unlimited data compares to other providers by visiting this comparison list of unlimited data plans.