Three UK Reveal 5G Mobile Prices – Unrestricted and At No Extra Cost

Mobile operator Three UK has today confirmed that all new and existing customers will have access to 5G, when it launches in August 2019 (details), with no mobile broadband speed caps and at no extra cost on all contract, SIM only and PAYG mobile plans. A big offer given their tendency toward “unlimited” data plans.

According to Three UK, the introduction of 5G will mean data use is set to increase by 13x in 2025 (this is based off Ofcom’s mobile data strategy 2016). With this in mind, the operator has chosen to make it really simple for customers to take advantage of all the benefits of 5G – without worrying about the amount of data they are using. The operator predicts that 80% of Three’s network traffic today will be covered by 5G within 3 years.

Admittedly you’ll still need a 5G capable device to benefit, which often means taking out a new plan (unless you’re more of a SIM-Only fan). In keeping with that, Three has today put the new Huawei Mate 20 X 5G smartphone on sale and this will soon be followed by the Samsung Galaxy S10 5G and Xiaomi Mi Mix 3 5G.

Dave Dyson, CEO of Three UK, said:

“Three is leading the way with 5G, by providing our customers with unlimited data and the fastest speeds. Our customers will be able to enjoy and explore a full 5G experience, at the same cost as 4G.

The forthcoming months are going to be game-changing and with our unrestricted plans, we are looking forward to unleashing the full potential of 5G to all.”

Out of all the main operators we’re currently most interested to see how well Three UK’s 5G network performs, which is because they already have a total of about 140MHz (frequency) across several 5G friendly mobile bands and one of those includes a 100MHz block of contiguous spectrum in the 3.4-3.8GHz band (here); ideal for the new service. By comparison their rivals only have 40MHz and 50MHz slices of the 3.4GHz band to use at launch.

The operator, which aims to cover 25 UK cities by the end of 2019, predicts that this will enable them to deliver 2x faster speeds than their rivals at launch, which if true would mean around 200-300Mbps (based on the fact that EE expects 100-150Mbps in the busiest areas).

All of this is very relevant because Three’s mobile customers are particularly data-hungry and consume 3.5x more data per month than the industry average (currently they gobble 8.3GB per month), which is no small part due to their focus on “unlimited” data plans. Indeed the company also offers a 4G Home Broadband package with unlimited data from just £23 per month or £11.50 with a 6 month discount (HomeFi) and they have a dedicated wireless ISP brand called Three Broadband (formerly Relish).

Elsewhere Three has been upgrading more than 4,300 sites across the UK as part of its £2bn investment to continue to meet the ever-increasing customer demand for mobile data and services – no matter whether you are on 5G, 4G or 3G. The operator claims that this capacity upgrade will boost the average data speeds by up to 33% and customers may already have spotted the 4G+ logo on their device when accessing upgraded sites.

One catch here is that Vodafone have also entered the unlimited data game with the launch of their new 5G mobile services (see here), which might give Three UK a run for their money.