You’ve surely heard the news by now: Virgin Mobile is getting its cherry popped. Optus is phasing out the Virgin brand, so if you’re a customer, it might be time to start thinking about your next move.
Virgin Mobile is wholly owned by Optus, and as such, powered by the Optus network. If you’re happy with your current coverage, it could be worth moving to Optus. Especially because Optus is offering a whole range of promotional plans to Virgin Mobile customers to get them to port over their number.
For example, current Virgin Mobile customers can get a 15GB plan for $30 per month on a 12-month contract if they switch to Optus. For comparison, a new Optus customer would normally play $35 per month for just 3GB.
Virgin customers who switch to Optus can also save a little when it comes to 24-month plans that include a phone. Prices will depend on what phone you’re after, but from what we’ve seen, you can save around $10 per month or get yourself a little extra data when compared to a standard Optus plan.
Notably, we’ve seen Optus offer to waive Virgin customers’ entire early exit fees as an incentive to switch over now. In one case, this would have saved a customer almost $400.
Virgin Mobile customers can check out what Optus deals are available to them here.
But what if Optus can’t fill the Branson-shaped hole in your heart? There’s plenty of other telcos to pick from, and to give you a head start, we’ve put together a round-up of plans similar to Virgin Mobile’s most popular SIM-only options.
If you want something similar to Virgin Mobile’s $40 per month 28GB plan, consider these:
If you want something similar to Virgin Mobile’s $32 per month 15GB plan, consider these:
If you want something similar to Virgin Mobile’s $24 per month 5GB plan, consider these:
Of course, there was more to Virgin than just great deals. One of its key propositions was “fair-data”, a catch all term that encompassed data rollover, data gifting, and data-free streaming.
While data rollover has become a lot more common since Virgin introduced it, it’s much harder to find on postpaid plans. Belong is your only option for data rollover on a postpaid plan (and in a similar vein, the only other telco that does data gifting).
If you’re okay with going prepaid, you’ve got far more choice. Telstra and Woolworths Mobile let you bank up to 50GB and 15GB of unused data, respectively. Boost and ALDI will rollover your used data to your next recharge, although your recharge needs to be equal or a larger than your current recharge on ALDI.
If you want to keep using Spotify, Google Play Music, or iHeartRadio without eating into your monthly allowance, Optus offers data-free music streaming through the same services as Virgin Mobile. If you’re okay with changing streaming service, Telstra and Boost Mobile offer data-free music streaming through Apple Music.
