XTREAM Powered by Mediacom Internet Plans and Pricing Review 2023

You’ve got three XTREAM internet plans to choose from: A basic plan with 100Mbps, a middle-ground option with 300Mbps, and a nuclear gigabit option.

Understandably, the Internet 100 plan and its $24.99 price tag is extremely tempting, but allow us to be a wet blanket and direct your attention to a little something called a data cap. A data cap is like a monthly budget, and a 300 GB data cap (which is the Internet 100 cap) is the equivalent of living on a shoestring budget. You want to download a new video game on your PlayStation or Xbox? That’s gonna cost you a third of your monthly data budget. You want to binge a season of something on Netflix? That’s gonna cost you another third of your internet budget.

Before you know it, you’ve used up your 300 GB data cap in a week and now Medicom will add $10 to your bill and give you a measly 50 GB of data to get you through the rest of the month. The scary part is that these data cap overage fees can keep stacking up as you keep burning through the extra data. It doesn’t take long before you end up paying more than the Internet 300 plan. That’s why we don’t recommend the Internet 100 plan unless you’re the only internet-user in the household and you can keep track of your usage. But who really wants to do that?

For our money, it’s smarter to fork over the extra $20 a month and get the Internet 300 plan, which gets you faster data speeds and a much more generous 1,500 GB data cap. And if you’ve got a house full of streamers and gamers, you absolutely want to spring for the full 3,000 GB and gigabit internet speeds.

Whatever XTREAM internet plan you choose, don’t get too accustomed to the introductory price. After you finish your first year of service, the Internet 100 plan jumps up to $34.99, and the Internet 300 plan jumps up to $64.99, and the Internet 1 Gig plan jumps up to 84.99. But that’s not all. The Internet 300 and Internet 1 Gig plans price hikes continue even after the second year of service–Internet 300 goes to $84.99, and the Internet 1 Gig plan shoots up to $109.99 in your third year of service. Just when you think you can’t take it anymore, you get one last price hike for being such a loyal customer: Internet 300 caps at $99.99 a month, and Internet 1 Gig caps at $119.99 a month. It’s like the opposite of a customer loyalty program—the longer you stay with Mediacom, the more they charge you.

It’s worth noting that you don’t need to sign a contract or commit to service with Mediacom, so you can easily cancel your plan after the first or second year of service and check out a different internet service provider. Even if you think you don’t have other internet options in your neighborhood, you might get a better experience with a 5G internet provider or satellite internet.

I tried to make this subsection sound more exciting (“xciting,” if you will), but you just can’t make “xtra” fees sound more enticing, can you? Anyways, if you decide to rent your internet modem directly from XTREAM, you pay $14 a month (which is a few dollars more expensive than your average modem rental cost). But instead of paying $14 a month (or $168 over the course of a year), we’d recommend just buying your own modem.

You also need to pay a one-time $45 installation fee and a $10 activation fee. The $55 total you’re paying for installation and activation is annoying, but par for the course when it comes to cable providers.

All in all, count on paying an extra around $55 when you get your internet service installed, and an extra $14 every month if you decide to rent a modem directly from Mediacom.

If XTREAM by Mediacom is one of the only internet service providers in your neck of the woods, we recommend signing up for a plan for a year or two at most. We still recommend skipping the Internet 100 plan unless you can stay under a 100 GB data cap. You get the best value by signing up for either the Internet 300 or Internet 1 Gig plans and jumping ship after your promotional pricing runs dry after the first or second year of service.

XTREAM is available to about 6.8 million people in 22 states. The majority of its coverage is in Illinois, Iowa, and Georgia, but it also has pretty big service areas in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Kentucky, Missouri, Louisiana, North Carolina, and the panhandle region of Florida. A few pockets of Arizona and southern and northern California have XTREAM coverage as well. But for the most part, XTREAM is a Midwestern internet service provider.

You can find out if XTREAM services your neighborhood by entering your ZIP code below:

XTREAM’s mid-tier Prime  Internet 300 plan costs less than comparable plans from other internet service providers:

Of course, the big caveat to call out here is that the price you see with Mediacom only lasts for the first year. After that, the plan gets $20 per month more expensive, then the cycle repeats itself until you max out at $99.99 a month. Mediacom isn’t the only cable internet company that hikes up your bill (we wish it was); Cox and Xfinity also increase your bill after 12 months of service. Still, gotta give points to Mediacom for charging less than the average ISP for that first year of internet service.

The main exception here is T-Mobile 5G Home Internet, which doesn’t go any higher than the $50 a month the service currently costs. You don’t get as reliable data speeds with 5G home internet compared to cable, but at least your price doesn’t go up every year.

If you watch a lot of live sports—or live TV in general—it might be worth it to bundle your cable internet with Mediacom’s cable TV service. It saves you a few bucks every month compared to paying for the services individually, and you can rest assured you get your local sports networks, which can be annoyingly tricky to watch with streaming services.

Plus, from one sports fan to another, I miss watching NBA games with a cable service. When I stream games, I always end up a minute or two behind the live action and get moments spoiled for me when I check Twitter (or X) for reactions.

Here’s a look at what bundle deals from Mediacom look like right now:

XTREAM impresses with affordable introductory pricing for its cable internet plans, but unfortunately the price of plans goes up significantly (by about $20, respectively) for every year you have the service. But on the plus side, Mediacom doesn’t require you to sign any long term contracts when you sign up for an internet plan, so you could theoretically cancel your service before things get too expensive.

• Prices and plans: XTREAM’s introductory pricing beats out pretty much any other ISP we could think of, but the price hikes are pretty intense. We recommend bailing and switching to another ISP after the first year or two of service.
• Data Speeds: XTREAM by Mediacom offers internet plans with 100Mbps, 300Mbps, and gigabit speeds. We’ve got no issue with the data speeds offered by XTREAM, but we do take issue with the laughably low data caps, especially for the Internet 100 plan. One person could easily pass a 300 GB data cap in a month, let alone a household of streamers and gamers. To avoid paying the infinitely stackable $10 fee of 50 GB of additional data, we recommend avoiding the Internet 100 plan.
• Equipment: XTREAM’s modem costs $14 every month to rent. You’d probably be better off buying your own modem.

To review XTREAM by Mediacom cable internet service, our approach boiled down to analyzing five main factors: Price (including price hikes), data speeds, data caps, and regional availability. Our methodology used the following steps:

       1. Data Collection

We began by gathering data on XTREAM internet plans from official Mediacom sources, including its website and customer service representatives. We also read about user experiences on social media sources (like Reddit) to gain insights from real customers' experiences.

       2. Pricing Analysis

We looked at pricing for Mediacom internet plans and compared those prices to other ISPs around the country. We factored in introductory pricing, along with price hikes that may occur after the promotion ends. Additionally, we look through conditions of service contracts to make sure users don’t get fined if they decide to cancel and switch internet service providers.

       3. Speed and data cap assessment

Whenever possible, we test internet plans on our own and perform speed tests to measure performance. We also factor in data caps or any limitations imposed by each plan. We look for plans offering higher data speeds and higher data caps (or no cap at all) in making recommendations.

       4. Regional availability

As Mediacom's service isn’t available nationwide, we considered the geographical coverage of XTREAM internet plans. Understanding the areas where its plans are accessible helps readers know if Mediacom is even an option in the first place. In this case, XTREAM by Mediacom mainly services folks in the Midwestern United States, along with some pockets in the South.