This past Wednesday I read an article in USA Today about a company known as FreedomPop. They asked themselves the question a lot of us should start asking on our own. Why am I paying so much for phone coverage? They want every person to have access to a smartphone and for a lot of people (including me) the plans from major companies out there are insanely expensive. This company is pioneering a new movement that they hope will shatter the whole smartphone market.
The beta phone that could rattle the market.
Just to give you some background, FreedomPop started up about a year ago with the motto “the Internet is a right, not a privilege.” In the year since they have created a massive network piggy backing on Sprint. This isn’t some small start up company with no foundation, they have entrenched themselves in the mainstream market with Sprint. Now you may be asking what do they offer that’s so amazing? Well let me give you some pros and cons.
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FreedomPop Pros
- Free!!!! Yes you heard me right, if you really wanted to you could get their phone service for free. The basic plan is 500 texts, 500 minutes, and 500mb of data for free. All you have to pay for is the phone($99) and voicemail ($2.50) per month. Compared to some basic plans out there that’s absolutely insane. Paying about two fifty a month is pretty acceptable for people who want some of the perks of having a smartphone but don’t use it as much.
- $11 dollars: that’s all you pay for unlimited calling and texting and 500mb of data. This a plan I believe about 90% of people could live with but only 10% of people believe they could. In a world conquered by wifi and the Internet becoming easier to access for free the idea of needing unlimited data is starting to die off. Think of all the places you go to on a daily basis and you will find a majority offer wifi. Now take into account that the phone you get with FreedomPop is a smartphone by HTC. It has wifi, Android, and a pretty good touchscreen. For about $13 dollars a month I’m pretty sure we could all start living on 500mb.
- Sprint: FreedomPop will be piggy backing on Sprint’s network whose coverage may not be as good as Verizon or AT&T but still delivers the speed and coverage that’s better than companies like MetroPCS. This union could lead to better phone options.
Coverage and other features could be questionable.
FreedomPop Cons
- Lack of Phones: They only have one phone on their site but do plan to grow in the future. There is also debate on the voice service, VOIP, being unreliable but a lot of that is a matter of personal opinion. Since it’s also quite new, coverage may have some unseen quirks. LTE support should also be coming in the future so it’s a waiting game for now.
- Coverage: Since they are piggy backing on Sprint it is believed that their coverage would mimic Sprint’s map. But they don’t exactly show that they just tell you if you’re covered. There are also priority questions between Sprint users and FreedomPop users, is it equal or unfair? Nobody can know for now.
- Beta: personally I would wait another year to let them get firmly established since they have already sold out for many areas. This will allow you to see what other phones they might offer in the future as well. Patience is required but heck if I can get phone service for free and maxed out at $13 a month. Well. I will totally wait!
FreedomPop is a great idea and a lot people believe that if the word spreads then it’s popularity will rise. Their service is being compared to that of Amazon, because they are willing to lose money to gain popularity and eventually turn a profit. If this all pans out you could see me reviewing their phone service one day.
Are you willing to give a new service like FreedomPop a try right now or will you wait a little longer?
Wow, great article. I was thinking of switching to Metro in November when my contract is up but now I’m thinking I should look into this service also. A friend of mine says he gets great coverage with Metro. Do you really think FreedomPop has better service?
Do you know if Freedom Pop uses mytouch smartphones?
@Genesis well right now the only phone available is the HTC evo seen on their site, they plan on adding more in the future but since they are still in the beta stage they haven’t done anything.
According to FreedomPop they run their system on the Sprint Network whose voice coverage and 3G data is very broad compared to that of Metro. Sprints map can be seen on their site. If FreedomPop is true in stating they use the same network as sprint, to me personally their service over the U.S. Is better than Metro. But since they are still in the beta stage I would be a little cautious to jump right into FreedomPop.
I decided to try FreedomPop for both a wifi hotspot and an Android based mobile phone. I am using an HTC EVO 4G that was originally a Sprint phone which is now repurposed for FreedomPop. The wifi hotspot seems to work fine in my area.
The phone is a different story. I have full bars signal strength showing on the phone… guessing that is the Sprint Network signal strength. The phone rings about 30% of the time when people call my FreedomPop number as far as I can tell. There is no voicemail with the free service option so I don’t really know how many times people call without the phone ringing but anecdotally I think it is about 70% of the time that it does not ring when people call. Additionally, most of the time people tell me they cannot consistently understand me speaking to them via the FreedomPop service when using the Sprint network connection. I hear them crystal clear though. If I turn off 4G and use WiFi on the Android device instead, then the voice calls are pretty good in both directions… no major issues. WiFi connected service for voice = Good. 4G connected service for voice = not usable.
As for texting, it seems to be pretty reliable for receiving text messages but for sending it is unpredictable. I am experiencing about a 50% failure rate on outbound text messages sent to my AT&T mobile phone. For a free service, I guess I cannot complain too much. Inbound text = good. Outbound text = not reliable.
As far as customer service, I have found their web based self-service and response to my questions submitted via their online customer care to be good. Their responses have been reasonably timely and accurate as far as I can tell. The voice customer care is a different story altogether. I have called several times. Each time there system has disconnected the call on me when I was expecting someone to eventually answer. One time it was after my waiting listening to various announcements and music on hold for about an hour. The other times were much shorter but still very frustrating. One time yesterday I waited for about an hour and then their system gave me the opportunity to leave a voicemail with no other option. I left a voicemail requesting that someone call me back and provided by reliable phone number. I noticed a call from the 310 area code today but was not able to take the call at the time. There was no message left. I called the number from caller ID and received an automated system that identified FreedomPop as receiving the call. I did not wait on hold to talk to someone this time though.
Thanks for the free service FreedomPop! Can’t wait until you get done with the beta program and have a reliable service for me though.
No. I really do not believe FreedomPop has better service.