Best Military and Veteran Cell Phone Plans

Phone plans can get pricey, but the best wireless providers offer several discounts for active-duty military, veterans, and their families.

In this article, we cover the 5 best cell phone plans for members of the military, plus special discounts and deals to cut down your bill.

Each military cell phone plan listed below runs from $15 to $60 per month for one line, though some also offer discounts for multiple lines. Plans come with unlimited talk, text, and data within the U.S., as well as affordable roaming add-ons so you can stay connected to your loved ones when you’re deployed.

Whether you decide to go with a military discount from a major carrier or a steeper, available-to-everyone discount from an affordable MVNO carrier, you can find everything you need to know in this guide.

Best Military and Veteran Cell Phone Plans:

• What are the best cell phone plans for military members and their families?
• T-Mobile Experience More plan: Best military phone plan overall
• Mint Mobile 3 Month plan: Cheapest phone plan for military and veterans
• Visible $25 plan: Best value phone plan for military and veterans
• Verizon Unlimited Welcome: Best military phone and internet bundle
• AT&T : Best military phone plan for families
• Best cell phone military discounts
• How we picked the best plans for military
• FAQ

We researched the best cell phone plans for military members and their families to find a variety of plans that work for different budgets and scenarios. Here are our top picks:

The T-Mobile Experience More Military plan comes with a bunch of awesome features for military members and veterans. The plan comes with unlimited talk, text, and high-speed data. You can also get a hefty 40% discount when you add your family members to the plan with each line costing $30 per month when you have four lines.

A free Netflix, Hulu, and Apple TV+ subscription sweetens the pot, and regular military travelers can also take advantage of unlimited text and data you get in over 215 countries automatically—meaning you can hail an Uber right after your international flight without issue. 

Despite all the sweet perks, the biggest callout for T-Mobile is its 5G network. Users can expect faster speeds on average with T-Mobile than any other carrier. And while T-Mobile offers a great price for service members, you can also find more savings in our guide to lowering your phone bill with T-Mobile.

You can get an even cheaper cell phone plan that uses T-Mobile’s network by opting for a prepaid carrier like Mint Mobile. Mint Mobile doesn't have a military-specific discount, but Mint Mobile’s unlimited plan costs come in at a fraction of the price of T-Mobile’s Experience More Military plan. And you still get high-speed data, nationwide overage, and mobile hotspot data at no extra charge that pulls from your monthly 5G and 4G LTE data allowance. 

You can add unlimited phone lines on a Mint Mobile family plan for an extra $15 per month. At that point, you get an absolute steal for an unlimited plan on T-Mobile’s network. To lock in the price, you need to pay in advance for three months of service—you need to continue to pay in three-month installments for continued service at the discount price. (Otherwise, your price increases to $25/month for three months, paid via $75 payment.)

If you want to stick with Verizon’s excellent network but don’t want to pay a ton for your cell phone plan, you can get a more affordable unlimited plan with an MVNO carrier that rents the same cellular network but offers cheaper rates. Our top recommendation for military members and veterans is Visible.

Visible is available everywhere Verizon is, and its $25 plan—a whole $30 cheaper than the Verizon Unlimited Welcome plan with a military discount. “I got tired of paying the high prices with Verizon. Visible is way cheaper and for my usage I haven't noticed any difference in coverage or performance,” says Bison Messink, a current Visible customer. 

Verizon offers the best phone plan and internet service bundle discount to military members and veterans. When you bundle a 300Mbps Verizon Fios internet plan with a Verizon wireless phone plan, your internet only costs $29.99 monthly. Without the military bundle discount, you would pay $49.99 for a standalone 300Mbps Fios plan. This is well worth getting as Verizon is one of the best fiber internet providers you can get thanks to its impeccable reliability and fast speeds.

In terms of the phone plan itself, Verizon gives a great phone plan discount for military members and their families. The Verizon Unlimited Welcome plan usually costs $65 per month, but the price goes down to $55 per month with the military and veteran discount. The Unlimited Welcome plan comes with unlimited talk, text, and data, plus 25% off select tech accessories. 

AT&T’s Unlimited Starter^® PL plan is a great option for military or veteran families. The Unlimited Starter SL plan comes with unlimited talk, text, and data between the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, unlimited texting from the US to 200+ countries, and 5G hotspot data. Even better, the plan comes with the ActiveArmor app, which offers spam risk call blocking, harmful website blocking, and most importantly, public Wi-Fi protection.

Military members and veterans can get AT&T's Unlimited Starter SL plan for $49.49 per month for one line, or as low as $26.99 monthly per line when you get four lines, which includes a 25% discount. 

Wireless providers have discounts that apply to multiple plans, so if one of the above plans isn't up your alley, you can still get a great deal. Here are a few of our favorite military and veteran discounts from the top wireless providers: 

Reviews.org uses price comparison tools to evaluate every cell phone plan, but price isn’t everything. In this case, we looked at the military phone plans offered from T-Mobile, AT&T, and T-Mobile, and considered factors like price, data caps, and coverage. We also compared the military plans from the big three carriers against the unlimited plans you can get from prepaid carriers like Visible or Mint Mobile.

After getting a comprehensive view of the military discounts from the major carriers and the discounted rates from prepaid carriers, we leverage our hands-on experience and extensive research to pick the best cell phone plans for military members and their families.

Reviews.org makes money when readers click our sponsored links, but this piece was researched and written independently. Our brand partners do not read our pieces or preapprove our pieces before they are published.