Update: 1/22/21 – I can no longer recommend Total Wireless for any reason at all.
The customer service is terrible, the policies have been changed with no explanation, and the store takes orders and your money and then refuses to cancel them when they don’t send your products.
Everyone, go to Mint Mobile instead. It’s where I’ve since moved my service.
We have not had a home phone line in over a decade. So it goes without saying that our mobile phone service is super important.
Unfortunately, it was also super expensive – especially on our budget.
I started seriously looking at our bills a couple of months back and one of the places I desperately wanted to save money was on our monthly phone service. But I just couldn’t figure out how we could do it. We each need a smartphone and we need unlimited talk.
Enter Total Wireless.
When I first saw the signage on display at Wal-Mart, I was extremely skeptical. (I had heard some unpleasant things about Straight Talk, another Wal-Mart product, in the past.) But after a few weeks of hemming and hawing, I decided to take the plunge and try Total Wireless.
Guess what?
It cut our family’s phone bill in half. That’s a pretty big deal.
Read on to see how using Total Wireless has worked for us! Oh – and let me add this – this is NOT a sponsored review. I haven’t received anything in exchange for this post and I paid for these products and services myself. This is a truly honest Total Wireless review.
Total Wireless Phone Unboxing
Before I share my experience with Total Wireless service so far, I want to give you an idea of what to expect when you purchase a Total Wireless phone and a monthly plan.
I ended up getting an LG Ultimate 2 – it was $59.99 and it had great reviews and the features I wanted, including a front-facing camera.
As you can see on the inside cover, you can choose from several monthly phone plans when you subscribe to Total Wireless. We went with the two-line $60/month plan, since it allows us to share data and have unlimited minutes and texting.
Inside the phone box, you’ll find an instruction manual and an activation card. It’s EXTREMELY easy to activate your Total Wireless service, by the way. All of the instructions are on the card, plus the website walks you through the process.
A Total Wireless monthly plan card looks like what you see above. You can purchase it online, along with your device, or as a standalone card at a store.
Rather than purchasing a new card each month, we bought our initial card and then signed up for monthly auto-refill. Doing that gives you a tiny discount as well.
Also – the phone is returnable (within a certain amount of time). The monthly plan card is NOT. So keep that in mind.
And here are the contents of my phone box. The phone comes disassembled, but you only have to insert the battery and replace the back cover. After that, you just turn it on and follow the onscreen prompts. Easy peasy.
Total Wireless Review
As of this post, we’ve had service with Total Wireless for a month and a half. In that time, I have to say that I’m pretty satisfied so far. If you use the Internet a LOT when you’re away from home, though, it might not work for you.
Right now, the company only offers 3G service. HUGE ANNOUNCEMENT: Total Wireless now offers 4G LTE service on select phones!!!! So if you choose one of those phones, you can stream on the go like everyone else. 🙂
If you choose a phone that only has 3G capabilities, when you’re away from a WiFi signal, you can’t stream video, you can’t download new apps, and you can’t use some services without SERIOUS delays.
Having said that, I’m almost never away from a WiFi signal. So that has not posed an issue for me. If I needed on-the-go Internet, I’d probably decide not to use Total Wireless. If 4G service becomes available, though, then this will become a non-issue. (Again: NOW available as of January 2017!)
For us, saving 50% on our phone service has been worth it. And scoring a good Android device for a reasonable price didn’t hurt either!
Total Wireless Review Update
Updated 1/22/22 – When a company decides to go anti-consumer, it really goes all out.
I ordered a phone from Total Wireless in December 2021. The order went through, but never changed status from “Processing”. After two weeks with no update, I used the online chat to ask a Total Wireless rep about my order. The rep told me that the order could not be cancelled. Oh – and there was no update on it, either. I filed a dispute with PayPal and got my money back.
Later, I wanted to cancel my service and I was told “The system cannot cancel your service at this time.”
So I ordered my new phone unlocked directly from Apple. When it arrived, I hopped over to Mint Mobile, downloaded the app, and in 10 minutes, had transferred my number away from that horrible company.
Interestingly, when I went to have my old phone unlocked to give to my daughter, the Total Wireless rep told me that I had to wait 60 days. With no explanation at all.
I will never, ever, ever use that company for any reason ever and I hope they go bankrupt.
Updated 1/14/17: We’ve been Total Wireless customers for over a year now and we’re still extremely satisfied! I just purchased one of the Total Wireless devices that is 4G LTE capable – a ZTE Citrine LTE – for $29.99. It’s great. I had to do a long indoor run on the treadmill for three hours a few weeks back and I totally watched two episodes of Sherlock while I did it.
We’ve never had any serious issues with phone coverage or service and, since we’ve signed up for the automatic monthly billing service, we get a $5 discount on our monthly plan. So we’re paying $58 a month for TWO monthly wireless lines. It’s awesome.
How do you save money on your family’s phone bill? Do you have any thoughts or questions about our Total Wireless review? Let us know in the comments! And stop by the Total Wireless website to see if the service is available in your area!
Check out some of our other posts while you’re here!
Thanks. I had been looking at this for a while now but really skeptical of trying it because we tried Straight Talk and were not pleased. $110 a month will be a great help to us vs the over $200 we spend every month on our phone bill.
I know! Cell phone bills are crazy high for families!
I hadn’t heard of this before! I’ll have to check it out.
It’s really helped our monthly budget. Hope it works out for you!
I recently made the switch from Verizon post-paid plan to Total Wireless. Since it’s same towers and 4gLTE service, I figured it was best option at half the cost and I could use my current smartphone. I needed to keep my existing phone number, and that process (porting) was buggy. VZ shut me down as soon as TW requested phone port. Call service came up with TW SIM within 15 minutes, but I had no data. I called a few times over next several hours and all they could tell me was to wait. After about 16 hours, they said porting process was complete, but I still had no data service. This time they told me to call another support number. That individual was able to change some settings at their end and data finally came on. I immediately noticed however, that downloads were SLOW. I called again and was told speed is capped at 5mb/S. Total Wireless advertising doesn’t disclose that anywhere. I was averaging 50mb/S with Verizon! I’m not sure if the slower speed will work out for me.
Total Wireless online account access has very limited functionality. I can’t even change my password. The over-seas support staff leaves much to be desired. Although polite, they are difficult to understand and rush you off the phone. They often end up telling you there is nothing they can do at this time. It’s a classic case of getting what you pay for. Hopefully, I won’t have any more reason to call them.
I cannot recommend Total wireless. I will be considering other carrier. Perhaps Verizon prepaid. It’s only a bit more $ than TW, but still cheaper than contract plans.
I’m sorry you had a rough experience with customer service. That’s frustrating. I haven’t experienced that at all. I updated my service with a new phone two weeks ago, and it took me all of five minutes on the phone in a customer service chat. My rep was clear and understandable and rolled over my unused days without a hitch. I also haven’t had any trouble using the website to update my account info or payment options. Hopefully, the service has improved across the board since your experience.
I currenly use Verizon and it is outrageously priced but in our area it is the only company that covers the state…nothing else does. I looked at a map for total and it looks identical to verizon’s map. Verizon kills us with various taxes on the lines. how much taxes do you pay on a monthly basis if that’s not asking too much? Also, would you say the quality is just as good as your last provider? How’s the new 4g phone you purchased. Also, since I’m a bit older, can you clear a few things up for me? Like, you purchased the $60 plan, so, you pay $60 a month for it, correct? No contract to sign? so, you can discontinue service whenever you want to? Thanks much for your review
Hi! Yes, Total Wireless uses the same towers as Verizon. I’ve never had a problem with coverage at all. I don’t use a contract. We did sign up for the automatic billing, though, to save 5 percent a month. But you can turn it off anytime.
I love my new phone! It’s basic, but I don’t need a lot. It’s still a smartphone and my service is great.
So is there help for transferring info from current phone to new phone, such as contacts and pics? as you can tell from this question, i am not tech savvy. I do not have such information stored on a removable memory card that i am aware of.
Total Wireless has an app that will make your transfers so so so easy. We were Verizon Customers, 2 high dollar phones 2 laptops. Our old Bill 195.00 (take 50 off phones paid for).
Now just 60.00 a month total means just about 85 a month in savings!!!!! thats over 1000.00 a year!
Total Wireless customer support just told me that Total Wireless does not support ANY iPhones. Unfortunately they didn’t tell me that before I signed up for the 3 person monthly plan and they won’t refund or change that to a 2 person plan. UGH
Ahhh….I only choose my phone before signing up, so I didn’t know that either. But I’m not an iPhone user either. I think they *used* to offer iPhones, though, because I’ve seen them for sale on the website in the past. That might be a new policy.
When I signed up the CSR assured me that my daughter’s iPhone 6s was supported. But they couldn’t make it work on the plan with the new SIM card. THEN they told me Total doesn’t support iPhones and of course there is no refund.
iPhones are not supported by TW? I bought the iPhone 5S for my daughter at Walmart last year from TW, and it’s been over a year now and it is working flawlessly. I just did the BYOD on Monday, and activated my Verizon pay as you go Samsung Galaxy S4 to TW $35.00/plan. I did it all online and took me 2 minutes. Everything is very well explained, so it went without a glitch. I didn’t want to call CS because of the bad reviews and all, and not being able to understand the CS Agents, that’s why I did it online. I’m glad I did because the whole process took me under 3 minutes. I could use my data right away. As soon as it showed the “Congratulation, your device is now activated” I rebooted my VZ phone, called my husband’s phone and he answered. Then I sent him a text with a picture and it went through as well. I then went outside and turned on Data, and my VZ phone connected me to FB and Google right away. So far so good. since my daughter and I are now with TW, I’d like to set up the Auto Refill so I can choose the $60.00/plan for $57.00/month and 15GB of data, but I’m afraid that TW agents will keep charging my credit card for things that I didn’t buy. So, that’s my only concern right now. But overall, I’ve waited over a year to do the switch from VZ to TW, since I had already bought a TW device for my daughter and everything went flawlessly. We are both happy campers so far. Hope it stays that way because I cannot afford VZ. if this doesn’t work along the way, I will go back to Virgin as I never had problems with their $35.00/month plan and never ran out of data.
Hey! Glad to hear your iPhone works well with TW. I wondered about the previous concerns because I’ve seen iPhones for sale through TW for quite a while. But maybe there are only issues if you bring your own iPhone from another carrier.
We use the auto refill option and have for over a year. We’ve never had any issues with unapproved charges. Just FYI. 🙂
Selena, you need to get your iphone carrier unlocked which verizon has to do for you if you own the phone. All you need to do is get verizon to carrier unlock the phone which they’re required to do by law.
Hey! Thanks for the tip! I don’t have an iPhone, but another commenter does, so this may come in handy. 🙂