Hopefully, you won’t need to contact them at all. Regardless of which you choose, be prepared to solve issues on your own and not receive much help from customer service. But somehow, Cricket manages to have worse customer service than Cricket. Both aren’t great in this race to the bottom. With any budget carrier, set your expectations too low when it comes to customer service. Winner: Straight Talk Straight Talk vs Cricket Wireless: Customer Service When it comes to phone selection and leasing, you’re better off going with Straight Talk or looking for an affordable option from a national carrier. If you don’t pay within 90 days, you could end up paying nearly double for your iPhone. Cricket has a “Progressive Leasing” program that can be really expensive. If you can pay the phone off in less than a year, Straight Talk won’t actually charge you any interest. Unlike leasing through a major carrier or direct from Apple, you can expect to pay added interest, particularly if you opt for a 24-month lease plan. Straight Talk has a huge selection, so if you’re looking for more options to go with them.īoth companies also do offer phone leasing options. You can find the latest flagship phones on their sites, but both are known for their collection of budget smartphones under $300. You can also purchase phones directly from both Straight Talk and Cricket Wireless. Then you can purchase a SIM card, load up money, and select the best plan for you. You can easily check on either site to see if your phone will work on their network or not. Cricket Wireless: Bring Your Own Phoneīoth carriers have brought your own phone compatibility. This combination gives it a clear advantage over Cricket Wireless. So if Verizon is better by you, you can go with it instead of relying on AT&T. The difference between Straight Talk and Cricket, however, is that Straight Talk doesn’t have speed caps.Īnd you can choose the network that has the best coverage for the area you live in. If you purchase a phone from Straight Talk, it will use a GSM network, either T-Mobile or AT&T. For example, if you’re bringing a Sprint phone to Straight Talk, you choose a SIM card designed to run on Sprint. You do this by selecting your phone’s compatibility.
Straight Talk can operate on any of the major carrier networks. Straight Talk’s coverage and performance are a little more complicated. It generally has excellent coverage, but you may suffer from performance issues because of speed caps. Cricket: Coverage and PerformanceĪs mentioned, Cricket uses AT&T’s network. When it comes to multi-line plans, Cricket is the clear winner.
These plans are a part of the Cricket Core Plan with:Ĭricket also has fixed-rate data plans from $70-$130 per month at 5 GB per line at 8 Mbps speeds. However, they now provide a 2-line, unlimited plan for $90, which is a savings of $20 on their single-line plans.Ĭricket has a variety of family plans for 2-5 lines ranging from $80-125. Straight Talk doesn’t offer any family plans. Only the Cricket More plan offers a personal hotspot for users. *The Cricket Core Plan offers data speeds at a max of 3Mbps while Cricket More provides unlimited data access on 4G LTE speeds (although the network may slow due to congestion, regardless of data usage).