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T-Mobile Home Internet: Can It Really Handle All Your Broadband Needs? – CNET

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T-Mobile Home Internet rating

How we calculated our rating Speed

6.5/10

Customer Care

8/10

Pros

  • No contracts
  • No data caps
  • Simple, affordable pricing
  • Aggressively competitive with its terms and perks

Cons

  • Speeds may vary
  • Max download speeds don’t match fiber and cable
  • Home internet customers deprioritized over mobile
See more pros and cons

T-Mobile must be feeling chuffed about its 5G home internet offering. The number of subscribers has risen to approximately 5 million customers, per the company’s fourth-quarter 2023 report. The Federal Communications Commission included T-Mobile’s home internet offering as one of only 11 fixed internet services able to cover over 5% of the US population. In 2023, the company made a splash with the latest American Customer Satisfaction Index survey results, which placed it at the top of all nonfiber national internet service providers. Pretty nifty.

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One size to fit all

There aren’t many qualifiers when discussing T-Mobile Home Internet plans. It’s one plan, one price and no additional fees. The premise of 5G home internet is that, unlike typical internet connection types (including coaxial cable lines, fiber-optic internet and digital subscriber line), you’re not reliant on underground constructions and deployments to get you connected. Instead, it’s a fixed wireless service that provides you with a router that connects to a cellular signal.

T-Mobile

T-Mobile provides its Wi-Fi Gateway device, a combination modem and Wi-Fi 6 router compatible with T-Mobile’s 4G LTE and 5G networks. As you can see from the chart, the only variable is the average download and upload speed you’ll experience. At the bare minimum, T-Mobile says all eligible households should see average download speeds of 72 megabits per second. Depending on your location and the placement of the T-Mobile Gateway, you might see download speeds as high as 245Mbps.

Shouldn’t 5G home internet service be faster?

The hope and promise of 5G and its capabilities have not yet been fully realized. My colleague Eli Blumenthal has thoroughly detailed the basics of 5G and how not all “5G” is the same. In summary, faster 5G speeds come with shorter ranges. The farther the distance, the less speed on the top end.

For T-Mobile to hit the road running with availability to over 30 million households at its launch, it needed to lean on its 4G LTE network and its growing 5G network. That’s why my CNET colleagues averaged just over 40Mbps download speeds with T-Mobile Home Internet, and some households may get up to just over 100Mbps. Anecdotally, we’ve heard of some users seeing download speeds as high as 300Mbps. Still, T-Mobile’s FAQ section promises customers will “see typical download speeds between 72-245Mbps.” So, that may be plenty of speed for many but don’t expect the higher download speeds you might get with fiber internet or cable plans. At least not yet.

Where can you get T-Mobile Home Internet?

Image of T-Mobile 5G layer cake Image of T-Mobile 5G layer cake

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No. T-Mobile Home Internet features unlimited data. Customers will not have any potential data overage fees or charges hanging over their heads. That said, T-Mobile Home Internet customers could find their service slowed in cases where the company prioritizes its mobile users over its fixed wireless customers.

Yes. One of the appealing aspects of T-Mobile Home Internet is that its monthly fee — $60 a month and $40 monthly for eligible Go5G Plus and Magenta Max mobile customers — includes a 5G Gateway (a modem/router combo device). The T-Mobile equipment lease is included in the one fee, and all that’s required is that you return the device when you end service with T-Mobile.

For the most part, yes, but not unequivocally. As T-Mobile says in its Open Internet policy, “many factors affect the speed and performance that customers experience, including … proximity to a cell site, weather and the surrounding terrain,” so your download speeds, which average between 72 and 245Mbps, are not guaranteed. But customers should see download speeds higher than those typically achieved by Hughesnet (average of 50 to 100Mbps) and Viasat (12 to 150Mbps). The Starlink plans can boast a similar range (20 to 250Mbps) but are not as widely available as T-Mobile Home Internet. It’s also much more expensive — $90 to $120 monthly, plus a one-time equipment fee of $599.

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Plan Max speeds Monthly price Equipment fee Data cap Contract
T-Mobile Home Internet
Read full review		 72-245Mbps download, 15-31Mbps upload $60 ($40 for eligible Go5G Plus and Magenta Max mobile customers) None None None