Verizon 5G Home Internet vs. T-Mobile 5G Home Internet

T-Mobile Home Internet vs. Verizon Home Internet

Verizon offers bigger mobile bundle discounts and faster download speeds than T-Mobile’s home 5G plans. But we’d recommend using both providers’ trial periods to test your home’s 5G coverage before signing up for the long haul.

Verizon 5G Home Internet vs. T-Mobile 5G Home Internet pros and cons

✓ Fast download speeds up to 1,000 Mbps
✓ Excellent Verizon Wireless bundle discounts
✗ Shorter price guarantees compared to T-Mobile

✓ Indefinite price guarantees with Price Lock program
✓ Great add-on offers
✗ Modest download speeds of up to 245 Mbps

Jump to:

• Deals and promotions
• Head to head
• Plans and prices
• Features

Verizon 5G Home Internet vs. T-Mobile 5G Home Internet

Data effective as of publish date. Offers and availability may vary by location and are subject to change.

T-Mobile and Verizon’s Home 5G internet plans rely on their 5G networks, but they differ in several areas.

With Verizon, you’ll have two 5G home internet plans that offer minimum download speeds of 85 Mbps or 300 Mbps. By comparison, T-Mobile has a one-size-fits-all home 5G plan with speeds between 72-245 Mbps.

You’ll get the best savings on both providers when you bundle a T-Mobile or Verizon phone plan with your home internet plan.

Deals and promotions

Verizon 5G Home Internet internet deals

Verizon’s best 5G Home Internet deals have included extended price guarantees, retailer gift cards, and 50% 5G Home Internet savings for Verizon Wireless customers. Check out our Verizon 5G Home Internet review to learn more about Verizon’s 5G service and current deals.

T-Mobile 5G Home Internet internet deals

Current T-Mobile 5G Home Internet deals include a $20 monthly discount for T-Mobile phone customers, free Pandora Premium and SiriusXM for four and six months, respectively, and a $150 Virtual Prepaid Mastercard®. Read our full T-Mobile 5G Home Internet review for a breakdown of the provider’s plan.

T-Mobile 5G Home Internet vs. Verizon 5G Home Internet packages and pricing

With no data caps and contract-free service, T-Mobile and Verizon pull out all the stops to draw new customers. But how’s the actual internet service? Let’s break down each provider’s home 5G plans.

*With Auto Pay.
Data effective as of publish date. Offers and availability may vary by location and are subject to change.

Verizon’s two home 5G plans offer more variety than other home 5G providers. Both plans are competitively priced, and if you add a qualifying Verizon Wireless plan to your bundle, you’ll stack on even more savings. Verizon also offers a generous 30-day satisfaction guarantee for new customers—by comparison, T-Mobile has only a 15-day trial period.

Most customers will qualify for the 5G Home plan, which offers speeds between 85 Mbps and 300 Mbps. With these download speeds, you’ll typically have enough bandwidth for two to four people.

Verizon’s 5G Home Plus plan comes with more add-ons (a three-year price guarantee, gift cards, and more), but its biggest feature is its faster download speeds between 300 Mbps and 1,000 Mbps. With these speeds, your household will be able to download large files and stream Netflix in 4K without issues.

Although most customers will likely get speeds closer to 300 Mbps than 1,000 Mbps on 5G Home Plus, we still appreciate the plan’s faster minimum speeds. 5G Home Plus’s speed minimum removes a lot of the performance unpredictability that’s baked into home 5G and narrows the reliability gap between 5G and cable internet. By comparison, T-Mobile’s speed minimums top out at a middling 245 Mbps.

But as with all 5G home internet providers, your download experience heavily depends on your location. In 5G Home Plus’s case, you’ll also need Verizon 5G Ultra Wideband coverage in your area to get the plan’s faster download speeds.

If your neighborhood doesn’t have 5G Ultra Wideband, you’ll have to settle for 5G Home’s slower download speeds. But even if its availability varies, we appreciate that Verizon offers a higher-tier home 5G option that provides more consistency akin to cable internet.

Data effective as of publish date. Offers and availability may vary by location and are subject to change.
*Requires one line with T-Mobile Magenta MAX plan.

T-Mobile’s sole home 5G plan covers the basics for a home internet plan. Although download speed ranges for home 5G plans are generally a crapshoot, T-Mobile’s estimated speeds are still worthwhile baselines.

At 72 Mbps, you’ll be getting around DSL-grade internet speeds, and your household will run into problems if more than two people want to watch Netflix or use the internet. At 245 Mbps, you’ll get cable internet-level speeds that’ll be fast enough for a family’s everyday internet needs. Although you might need to wait a second if you’re downloading PS5 or PC games, 245 Mbps download speeds will still provide enough bandwidth if multiple people want to watch Hulu or check YouTube.

But at the same time, T-Mobile is hamstrung by its limited plan options. T-Mobile does its best to narrow the gap with add-ons—T-Mobile’s Price Lock offers a nice indefinite price guarantee—but if you want download speeds faster than 245 Mbps, you’ll be out of luck on T-Mobile. T-Mobile’s modest home 5G speeds ultimately limit its appeal if you’re looking for faster or premium internet options.

T-Mobile 5G Home Internet vs. Verizon 5G Home Internet features

T-Mobile and Verizon’s Home 5G plans offer a bevy of bonuses beyond internet service to bring you onboard. Let’s break down some of each provider’s most important features.

Equipment

T-Mobile and Verizon both use gateway devices to bring a 5G internet signal into your home. T-Mobile and Verizon thankfully waive equipment fees, so you won’t need to tack on rental charges alongside your internet bill.

5G gateways are basically a combination modem/antenna/Wi-Fi router that receive a 5G signal from the closest T-Mobile or Verizon cell tower. But unlike cable internet hardware, 5G gateways need to be near a window in order to get a strong signal and can’t be tucked on an office shelf or under a desk.

Home 5G reliability

Home 5G’s big innovation is its convenience, but on Verizon or T-Mobile, its reliability can vary widely. The quality of your home 5G connection depends on the 5G cell towers in your region, which is partially why T-Mobile and Verizon have such wide download speed ranges on their home 5G plans.

If you’re close to a tower, you might reliably get a speed equal to or higher than your plan’s maximums. But your speeds will be on the lower end of your provider’s estimates if you’re near the edge of a tower’s range or in an area with high mobile traffic.

We’d recommend taking full advantage of Verizon and T-Mobile’s trial periods before dumping your current internet service provider. Both providers offer full money-back guarantees if you’re dissatisfied with 5G coverage in your area. T-Mobile has a 15-day guarantee, while Verizon has a 30-day guarantee.

Home 5G bundle deals

With Verizon or T-Mobile, you’ll get the biggest home 5G savings as part of a cell phone bundle.

Verizon will cut your 5G Home Internet bill in half if you sign up for at least one of its higher-tier 5G wireless plans. These plans start at $90 for a single line but offer stackable discounts down to $40 per line if you add more lines to your plan.

On T-Mobile, you’ll need to add at least one phone line with Magenta MAX (T-Mobile’s premium wireless plan) or Go5G Plus to get a $20 internet discount. But on a per-line basis, Verizon and T-Mobile’s plans run fairly neck and neck, and T-Mobile’s stackable line discounts also top out at $40 per line.

Is Verizon 5G Home Internet or T-Mobile 5G Home Internet better?

On paper, Verizon takes the win over T-Mobile thanks to its faster minimum download speeds, longer trial period, and better plans.

Still, we recommend using Verizon or T-Mobile’s trial periods to ensure your home gets a reliable 5G connection. Whether you’re with T-Mobile or Verizon, 5G home internet is heavily location-dependent, and the 5G coverage in your area will determine the quality of your internet service.

Verizon 5G Home Internet vs. T-Mobile 5G Home Internet internet FAQ

Methodology

Our experts analyzed all three internet plans from Verizon 5G Home Internet and T-Mobile 5G Home Internet for more than 18 hours to see how each provider held up in terms of price, features, and reliability. We also drew data from our T-Mobile 5G Home Internet and Verizon 5G Home Internet reviews for additional reference.

For more information on our methodology, check out our How We Rank page.