Best prepaid cell phone

[brekin67]

I need to purchase two prepaid cell phones for our vacation. I will only use them for about 10 days once per year.

What can you recommend, please?

 

[sharonmickey]

How much will you be using the phone? Is it primarily for calls or texts? Do you plan on keeping it to use again next year when on vacation? Please give a little more information so that someone can help you.

 

[brekin67]

My son and I will each be using a separate phone for 7 days while at Disneyworld. Normally our trip is for 10 days. I don't have nationwide on my current plan and don't want to change that. For calls only, and I don't care if we keep the same phone form year to year. Thank you.

 

[sharonmickey]

I have a tracfone. I think it was around $15. It has double minutes for life. It is a very basic phone, but it works for calls and texts. I can usually find an online code when I need to purchase more minutes. Check at Walmart, I found one online that is $14.88 (but it only has 20 minutes so you would need to purchase more). 60 minutes of call time is around $20 (120 if doubled) which would give you 140 minutes of call time for about $35 per phone. Plus any discount or bonus codes, I found a buy 60 minutes, get 60 free minutes code. Good luck.

 

[brekin67]

Thank you.

 

[MomToOne]

Also check out PlatinumTel - their per-minute charge is often lower than TracFone, even with TracFone's bonus/double minutes. I previously had my daughter on TracFone, but am switching her to PlatinumTel for a variety of reasons, including cost.

 

[mrodgers]

It's more than just recommending the company. The phones themselves are different. Some better, some worse, and some not good at all usually in the talk sound quality.

We have 3 Tracfones. My wife and I have the LG480G, a standard basic flip phone. It has double minutes, usually $15 at Walmart or Radio Shack. The sound quality when calling is pretty decent. For texting, Tracfone charges 0.3 "units" per incoming and outgoing text each. But, for the LG420G, the firmware has a bug that has been around for years that if you press the buttons on the side before opening the phone when you receive a text, it displays on the small front screen and the phone accepts the text without the charge of 0.3 units. Thus, incoming texts cost nothing. You can't read the whole text and still have to open the phone and go to your messages, but it doesn't charge.

My daughter has the Samsung 301. Call quality is horrible on that phone. Everything is incredibly delayed making it nearly impossible to converse with someone as well as the sound quality is so bad it is difficult to understand the other person talking. I wouldn't recommend that phone if you are going to talk at all on it.

From reviews and internet discussions, it seems that the Motorola phones have the best quality in sound and the best signal with the LG phones being a close second to the Motorolas.

Tracfones are really cheap for texting, we pay only $23.66 per month for all 3 phones and have plenty of minutes for communicating back and forth within the family. If you are one of these people who constantly have the phone in your hands, then Tracfone would be very expensive. Chitchatting on the Tracfone would take up a lot of minutes. We only use ours to keep in touch when at work (we work different shifts) and don't chitchat to each other or anyone else with them.

 

[brekin67]

Thank you.