Consumer Cellular's best price is age-gated

Consumer Cellular's strongest plan is Unlimited 50+, at $35 a month, or $33.25 with an AARP membership. As the name says, you have to be 50 or older. The equivalent plan for anyone younger is Consumer Cellular Unlimited, and it costs $60.

PureTalk has no age condition. Its unlimited plan is $34.99, and where Consumer Cellular's unlimited tiers slow after 35GB of high-speed use on a single line, PureTalk's slow after 50GB.

At 50 or over, Consumer Cellular earns its price

The comparison reverses. At $35 — or $33.25 with AARP — Consumer Cellular is within a dollar of PureTalk and brings three things PureTalk doesn't.

It runs on AT&T and T-Mobile together, automatically selecting whichever signal is stronger where you are, which is a genuine coverage advantage over any single-network MVNO. Talk and text cover the US, Mexico and Canada rather than the US alone. And it has no overage charge at all: exceed your allowance and the account moves you up a tier rather than billing you for the difference.

There is also somewhere to walk into. Consumer Cellular sells and supports through counters in Target stores. PureTalk is online-only, which is part of how its pricing works, but it means a broken phone is a phone call rather than a visit.

Consumer Cellular's fees are larger than they look

Both carriers quote before tax, but not by the same margin. Consumer Cellular adds roughly $4.88 per phone per month — $3.99 compliance, $0.88 universal service fund, $0.01 FCC — plus your state's tax, and charges $10 per line to activate. On its own plan records that turns a $35 plan into an effective $39–$41 and a $45 plan into $49–$51.

PureTalk's taxes and fees are extra too, and we treat every price on its ladder as a floor rather than a bill. But the itemised recovery charges are Consumer Cellular's, and on a two-line account they are close to $10 a month before anyone has used anything.

If you tether, it's PureTalk

PureTalk's plan ladder is really a hotspot ladder. Every $10 step buys tethering rather than phone data: 2GB at $34.99, 10GB at $44.99, 20GB at $54.99, 30GB at $64.99. The 50GB high-speed ceiling is identical across all four, so what you are paying for above $34.99 is hotspot, a phone discount, and free extra lines.

Consumer Cellular's plan records don't publish a dedicated hotspot allowance on any tier. If tethering is part of why you want the line, that absence is the whole answer.

Side by side

What we'd buy

• Under 50, on one line: PureTalk at $34.99. More high-speed data, a hotspot allowance, and $25 a month cheaper than the same thing at Consumer Cellular.
• 50 or over: Consumer Cellular Unlimited 50+ at $35, or $33.25 with AARP. The second network and the Target counter are worth the 35GB ceiling.
• You tether: PureTalk, at whichever rung matches your hotspot need.
• You want somewhere to walk into: Consumer Cellular, at any age.
• You use very little data: Consumer Cellular's $20 1GB plan is the cheapest entry point here, but check the fees — they push it to roughly $24–$26.

Neither is the cheapest way onto AT&T's network. Both are the cheapest way onto AT&T's network with a person answering the phone, which is a different and more expensive thing to buy.