Mobile phone buyers guide
Choosing the right mobile phone and tariff for you can be a difficult task. You will need to consider some if not all of the following:
Tariffs
- How often will you use your phone? Will it be just for emergencies or for regularly talking to friends and family?
- Would you rather have inclusive minutes to use every month or would you rather just pay for the calls that you use?
- Will you be calling people on another phone network, as that may cost more than people on the network you choose
Phones
- Are you interested in the latest phone which can download apps and browse the Internet, or do you simply wish to talk and send the occasional text message?
- Do you want a phone with a keyboard or a touch screen?
- Do you want a colour screen and/or the ability to play games?
- Will you want to download the latest ringing tones to your phone?
These are only a few thing to think about but there are many more questions which you probably have.
Not all phones are available on all the networks, so you may also be limited in which network you do go for if the phone is the most important aspect.
Choosing the network
In the UK there are 5 mobile phone networks to choose from (Virgin Mobile uses the T-Mobile network):
- O2 Coverage Checker
- Orange Coverage Checker
- T-Mobile Coverage Checker
- Vodafone Coverage Checker
- 3 Coverage Checker
The main factor for choosing a particular network is probably the coverage that they offer. If you buy a phone then you’ll want to know that when you want to use it you’ll be able to receive a signal. All networks provide this information to customers as shown by their coverage maps which you can visit by following the links above. 3 is the most recent network so has less coverage than the other four, but they do share another network if they themselves cannot provide coverage.
Choosing your tariff
All networks offer pay-as-you-go and pay monthly talk plans. If you are a light user who will only uses a mobile infrequently, then a pay-as-you-go mobile may be a better choice as you simply "top-up" your phone with calls whenever you need to, rather than paying £15 for example every month and not using it. Our simple mobile phone tariff calculator can help you decide which is better for you, although this is only a guide as your actual usage may be different. It’s best to over estimate your usage then we can calculate the estimated maximum that a mobile phone could cost you.
Choosing your mobile
With a pay-as-you go (PAYG) mobile you will have to pay the full cost of the mobile phone, whereas with a pay monthly tariff you can have many phones for free, or highly discounted. It’s best to shop around to find the best deal. You can try our mobile phone handset section which could help you find a new handset.
Health and Safety
You may have read in the papers and seen television reports surrounding the safety of mobile phones. There have been many reports which include the following:
- NHS - Mobile phone safety
- Cancer Research UK - Do mobile phones cause cancer?
- BBC News - Mobile phone brain cancer link rejected - 21 Oct 2011