Shane Cole
Nationwide contract-free wireless carriers Straight Talk Wireless and NET10 Wireless will begin offering Apple's flagship iPhone 5s and mid-range iPhone 5c at Walmart stores on Dec. 13.
As is customary for no-contract plans, buyers will be asked to pay full price up front for the handsets. Both the iPhone 5s and 5c will be available in a 16-gigabyte configuration for $649 and $549, respectively, a $50 discount from the devices' standard retail pricing.
The iPhone 5s will be sold both online and in Walmart stores, while the iPhone 5c will be offered only online. Walmart — Â which owns a portion of Straight Talk in a joint venture with TracFone — Â will provide interest-free financing for holders of the store's credit card, up to 18 months for the iPhone 5c and 24 months for the iPhone 5s.
Both Straight Talk and NET10 offer up month-to-month plans featuring unlimited U.S. voice minutes, text messages, and data transfer, along with unlimited international calling to a select list of countries, for between $45 and $65 per month. In addition, subscribers to NET10's "Friends and Family" plans can add additional lines at a $10-per-month discount.
Walmart began offering Apple's handsets directly to customers through Straight Talk, rather than as a reseller for larger carriers Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint, in January of this year. The retailer is one of the few apparently authorized by Apple to discount their devices, with prices generally $30 to $50 lower than competitors.
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32 Comments
[quote name="AppleInsider" url="/t/161105/apples-iphone-5s-5c-available-on-straight-talk-amp-net10-starting-friday#post_2444722"]Nationwide contract-free wireless carriers Straight Talk Wireless and NET10 Wireless will begin offering Apple's flagship iPhone 5s As is customary for no-contract plans, buyers will be asked to pay full price up front for the handsets. Both the iPhone 5s and 5c will be available in a 16-gigabyte configuration for $649 and $549, respectively, a $50 discount from the devices' standard retail pricing. [/quote] $649 and $549 are the standard pricing, not discounted at all. Did you mean to say that they will be $599 and $499 respectively?
If they don't run on AT&T, then this is pointless. For roughly the same price, buy it unlocked and use the BYOP AT&T SIM card for either. Doing it that way at least gives you access to AT&T's LTE, unlike the Verizon-based iPhones.
The iPhone 5c and 5s are capable of working on any US network as long as they're unlocked (and the provider allows use of equipment they didn't sell).
Last time I checked, the StraightTalk plans completely prohibited tethering (personal wifi hotspot) even on their so-called "unlimited data" plan. Since this is a valuable feature when traveling, and essential at home for me, I would never give it up. If it's important to you, always be sure to check the fine print!
Why, when AT&T’s network sucks? iPhones purchased from Straight Talk piggyback Verizon for the purpose of use, but as with all CDMA iPhones, they’re SIM unlocked. So what’s the complaint here?