Confirmed: Get Ready for Tiered Smartphone Data on Verizon Starting July 7th
With all of those juicy leaks looking as official as ever, you had to expect that this announcement would come hot off the heels of Independence Day: Verizon confirmed that they are nixing unlimited data in favor of a usage-based model. It’s officially starting July 7th. Pricing is the same that we’ve heard before: $20 gets you 75MB, $30 gets you 2GB, $50 gets you 5GB and $80 gets you 10GB. If you go over your limit in a pay period, expect to be charged an extra $10.
If you want more bandwidth, you can opt-in to use your phone as a mobile hotspot for $20 more than what you already pay and get two additional gigabytes. Current unlimited data users are automatically grandfathered in and will be able to upgrade to new phones and sign a new contract without losing their unlimited data.
It’s a change that we’ve seen coming since at least a year ago and we weren’t surprised at Verizon’s timing as 4G LTE expansion gets underway. So you have today and tomorrow (July 5th and 6th) to get your Verizon phone and be locked in forever. I’d take care of that without delay. [Fierce Wireless]