Best Internet and Phone Bundles

Optimum's internet, Wi-Fi, and cell phone bundle prices are some of the lowest around. But that doesn’t mean you’re stuck without quality service—you’ll still get everything you need to watch YouTube TV after work.

We’ve been impressed by Optimum's focus on smaller towns and communities, and its internet service performs well when compared to other cable internet providers.

Here's a quick look at how you can handle your Optimum internet and phone services:

Optimum's internet also comes with unlimited data, which is great if you need some face time and want to video call a family member overseas. Or if you prefer some “me time” and want to stream Loki all night long.

Optimum is also offering discounted prices for its internet plans during November. And now, for a limited time, Optimum is offering free installation on its internet service when you order online. 

Your Optimum phone service comes with unlimited calls to the US, Canada, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the US Virgin Islands. We’re sad to see calls to Mexico aren’t included though.

If you do need to call family or friends in Mexico or another country, take a look at Optimum's international rates before you dial. That way you’ll avoid a surprise whopper of a bill after you spend two hours chatting with your great aunt in Singapore.

Optimum international rates to popular countries (direct dialed per minute)

• Mexico: $0.02
• Australia: $0.2
• China: $0.51
• India: $0.02
• Brazil: $0.02
• Italy: $0.02

Optimum internet and phone services are available in small towns across 14 states. You’ll mostly find it in West Virginia, Arkansas, and Louisiana.

Cox Communications provides good quality internet, with speed performance that’s pretty middle of the road compared to other cable providers. The internet plan also comes with a 1.25 TB data cap, which isn’t as great as unlimited data—but it isn’t a small amount of data either. You can still hit up your favorite streaming service with no problem.

But what we really like about Cox’s internet and phone bundles are the options it offers for how your contact info shows up (or doesn’t show up) in the phone book.

More on that in just a bit, but first, here’s a quick look at Cox internet and phone bundles:

If you ask us, the best value comes from the Cox Go Faster + Voice Preferred and the Go Even Faster + Voice Preferred bundles. Both plans get you pretty good speeds for one person, even up to a middle-sized family, and the prices are average or below average.

Your Cox Voice Preferred phone service comes with baseline unlimited calls to landlines in the US, Canada, and Mexico. (Calls to cell phones normally cost more no matter which provider you’re with.)

There’s also an option to add an international calling plan for an extra $2.99 a month if you need to contact a relative in another country not on that list.

Without the international calling plan, here’s a quick peek at minute-by-minute international rates:

Cox Voice Preferred international rates to landlines

• Australia: $0.23 with international plan / $3.40 without
• China: $0.07 / $6.49
• India: $0.14 / $7.34

But by far our most favorite thing about Cox Voice Preferred are the extra little options. Here’s what you can choose from and how much it costs.

• Publish your name, number, and address in the phone book: Free
• Publish your name and number only in the phone book: Free
• Info available only with 411 directory assistance: $0.30/mo.
• Unpublished directory listing: $2.55/mo.
• International calling plan: $2.99/mo.
• External 8-hour telephone battery: $29.99

You can also choose to keep your current phone number or swap to a new one at no cost.

You can get Cox internet and phone service in 19 different states across the West Coast, East Coast, Midwest, and South, as well as a small part of the Northeast.

We won’t lie, DSL service isn’t the best in terms of speed or reliability. And with CenturyLink, where you live determines what speed you’ll get. So you might get lucky and land the 100 Mbps top-end speed, or you might get not-so-lucky and end up with 10 Mbps.

On the plus side, your price is locked in as long as you remain a good customer and pay your bills on time. And that applies no matter what internet speed you get.

If you live in a city where the CenturyLink Fiber Gigabit plan is available, you should probably spring for that despite the higher cost. (Unless you have a cheaper cable or fiber provider available.)

The Fiber Gigabit plan uses, you guessed it, a fiber-optic connection, which means it should have faster speeds and better reliability.

CenturyLink’s Unlimited Home Phone service lets you call Puerto Rico, Guam, and the US Virgin Islands, but you’ll need to pay for an additional calling plan to dial a number in any other country, including Mexico and Canada.

CenturyLink makes it difficult to find international calling rates too. So if you’re main reason behind getting home phone service is to call a country outside the US, you should check for other options first.

You’ll find CenturyLink in 16 states across the US, including Colorado, Minnesota, Washington, and North Carolina. (Notable states where you can’t get CenturyLink include California and New York.)

The CenturyLink Fiber Gigabit plan is available in only 19 cities throughout these states as well. So if you’re banking on getting that sweet fiber speed in your phone and internet bundle, check to see if your city is included in the list.

If speed is your need along with phone service, then be sure to check out Windstream’s Kinetic Fiber 1 + Phone bundle. This is the cheapest gig-speed bundle of all the large providers we analyzed.

Granted, you’ll still pay almost $95 a month for the luxury of streaking across the internet like a digital version of The Flash. But if you’re running a home business or freelancing as a creative professional, it’s worth it to get those speeds. (Maybe not so much solely to binge-watch Apple TV, though.)

Here’s a look at the other internet and phone bundles Windstream offers.

Windstream’s phone service  gets you unlimited calls to anywhere in the US, plus American Samoa, Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, Puerto Rico, and the US Virgin Islands.

So to make a call to Canada, Mexico, or anywhere else in the world, you’ll need to pay international rates alongside your phone plan fees. You do seem to get a discount on your international calling cost if you bundle your Windstream services. Here’s a glimpse of how that adds up:

Windstream tends to be found in rural areas of 18 different states in the South, Northeast, and Midwest. And depending on where you live, your Windstream bundle prices might change. So be sure to check out your local offers first.

Xfinity offers internet and home phone bundles mostly in the Central US, but you might be able to pair your internet with phone service in the Northeastern US too.

That said, if you can get an Xfinity internet and phone bundle in your area, it likely isn’t cheap—and it isn’t expensive either. Yup, Xfinity bundle prices are fairly middle-of-the-road, even with a 1.2 gig download speed.

Honestly, what makes these Xfinity bundles stand out is the option to add an international calling plan. Plus the fact that the basic Xfinity Voice service includes calls to Canada, China, India, Mexico, and more.

Xfinity Voice comes with unlimited nationwide calling, plus unlimited calls to Canada, China, Hong Kong, India, Puerto Rico, Singapore, and South Korea.

You can also add one of its international calling plans if you need to regularly call a country not on that list. Each plan gets you 300 minutes you can use to call landline phones (and mobile phones in certain countries) each month.

Xfinity international calling plans

• Carefree Minutes World Select 300: $9.95/mo.
• Carefree Minutes Latin America 300: $9.95/mo.

Xfinity is available across the US in 40 states. But its internet and phone bundles are pretty much limited to the Central US, which Xfinity generally defines as the following states:

On top of the usual features you should consider, like internet speeds, price hikes, and data caps, there are a few things to keep in mind when you’re shopping for internet and phone bundles.

• Internet speeds that meet your needs
• A data cap that won’t leave you high and dry at the end of the month
• A phone allowance that includes the countries you call the most
• An international calling plan or low minute-by-minute fees
• Whether you can keep your phone number

You might also find that some providers include extras. For example, Cox has options to remove your number from the phone directory. If features like this are important to you, be sure to ask about them before signing up—and get info on the cost.

If you need both services, most providers offer cheaper prices to bundle. Providers will often run deals on bundles for new customers that come with added incentives like Visa rewards cards or free streaming subscriptions.

But if you just need one service, such as internet, it’s cheaper to not bundle.

The cheapest internet and phone service bundle from a large provider is Xfinity's Connect Internet + Xfinity Voice bundle. It costs $40 a month and comes with up to 75 Mbps download speeds, 1200 Mbps of data, and unlimited calls nationwide.

• Optimum: $55.00–$170.00/mo.*, 300–940 Mbps download speeds, unlimited calls to the US, Canada, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the US Virgin Islands
• Cox: $40–$225.99/mo.**, 250–1,000 Mbps download speeds, unlimited calls to landlines in the US, Canada, and Mexico
• CenturyLink: $154.99–$244.99/mo.†, Up to 100 Mbps download speeds, unlimited calls to the US, Puerto Rico, and the US Virgin Islands
• Windstream: $64.99–$194.99/mo.††, 100–2,000 Mbps download speeds, unlimited calls to the US, American Samoa, Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, Puerto Rico, and the US Virgin Islands
• Xfinity: $95.00–$135.00/mo.‡, 75–1,200 Mbps download speeds, unlimited calls to the US, Canada, China, Hong Kong, India, Puerto Rico, Singapore, and South Korea

To narrow down our list of the best internet and phone bundle providers, we took a look at the following features:

1. Price for the internet speed you get
2. What countries are included in the basic calling plan
3. Whether there were options to add an international calling plan

We also took into account other features that set a provider apart, like phone book publishing options from Cox and CenturyLink’s price lock guarantee.