Best 365-day prepaid and long expiry mobile plans

There was a time when even the best 365-day plans featured only the minimum inclusions and were used more for receiving calls than making them (or parking a phone number). Back then, prepaid plans with 30-day recharge cycles included more overall value for calls and data. These days, most long expiry plans have shifted with the times, focusing more on data-usage than phone calls and texts. 

In this guide, we're going to take a look at the best 365-day plans and long-expiry prepaid plans available in Australia. But first, here's a look at the most popular plans in this category:

For the best cheap prepaid plan with long expiry, at the time of writing that crown was handed to the Catch 365 Day Plan - 120GB plan. This thrifty entry in our list of the best 365-day plans offers unlimited national calls and texts and 60GB of data for $89 with a 365-day expiry.

Obviously, if you guzzle data like water on a hot day then 600GB of data won't suffice for a full year (5GB per month), but if you hardly ever use the internet on your phone, this could be a really cost-effective option for you.

The only catch here is that you'll revert to the usual $120 on the first recharge and you have to sign up before the 28 November 2023 in order to get the cheaper price.

Here are some other cheap long-expiry prepaid plans for comparison:

If you don’t want to commit to the full 12 months with a 1-year prepaid phone plan, the Lebara Large 180-day plan is currently the best value choice with a decent 140GB of data for $130.

This one shakes out at roughly 11.5GB per month and includes unlimited standard national calls and texts, as well as unlimited calls and texts to 35 selected countries and another 50 minutes to Zone 1 countries. Lebara operates on the Vodafone 4G mobile network so be sure to check your coverage before signing up.

Here's a further list of 180-day long-expiry plans for comparison.

The most popular option for long expiry plans on the Optus network at the moment is powered by Catch Connect. This prepaid plan includes 120GB of data with 365-day expiry, which works out to be 10GB per month. That's not going to be enough if you stream Netflix in your morning commute but if you don't use much data and want to set and forget about your mobile bill, it might do the trick.

Optus itself offers a huge variety of long-expiry prepaid options but the majority of them don’t actually include any data and instead charge per MB used (which is deducted from your recharge amount). This is an archaic pricing model but Optus does have options for long expiry prepaid with included data. Here’s what’s on offer:

We've gone with Everyday Mobile for our pick of the best 365-day plans on the Telstra network for a few reasons.

Firstly, it offers decent data-per-dollar value at $170 for 125GB every 365 days (plus unlimited standard national calls). This prepaid plan has data rollover when you recharge before an expiry date, making it an even better deal.

The other reason we've rolled with Woolworths is its included grocery shopping discounts that you can claim every other month. If you spend $500 in one shop at Woolworths, you'll get 10% off, potentially saving yourself $50 per month. It's a great perk for big families where a $500 shop will be enough to get you through the weekend.

Here are a few more popular 365-day long expiry prepaid options on the Telstra network.

Long expiry prepaid plans are, by their very nature, relatively straightforward and no-fuss. Their simplicity is a big reason that people opt for them. Still, there's a few things to keep an eye out for when choosing a 365 day or 1 year prepaid phone plan:

There are a few different types of long expiry prepaid options. The most common is the 365-day recharge, but there are also 90-day and 180-day options. Every now and then, telcos will off one-year recharge options, which won't necessarily last you 365 days, instead they expire on a year from the day you activate. 

The easiest way to compare long expiry prepaid options is to calculate the equivalent monthly cost and inclusions. This allows you to compare 180-day and 365-day recharge options in a like-for-like way. For example, Kogan's $120 Small Flex Plan costs $120 for the first year and gets you 80GB of data to use over the year. That works out at roughly $10 and 6.6GB of data per month.

Different telcos offer different data rollover offers (some don't offer it at all). Some allow you to bank a limited amount of unused data for your next recharge, others let you rollover all of your unused data if you recharge before the expiry date. It's important to know which data rollover or data banking option is available to you before signing up. 

Again, different telcos have different ways of handling excess data charges. Some will simply charge a per-megabyte rate for all data used in excess of your inclusions, deducting that amount from the dollar value of your recharge amount. Others offer convenient auto-recharge options that automatically top-up your balance via direct debit when you run out of credit or your plan expires