How we calculate this

For each line on the plan, we add up the monthly plan cost and any monthly device installment, multiply by 36, then add one-time upfront costs (device purchase, activation fees) and subtract cash back from trade-in credits or resale. Summed across every line in the household, that's the 36-month total shown as the headline figure on each card.

We use 36 months because that's the horizon over which device installment plans and multi-year trade-in credits fully pay out — comparing at 12 months would make a "free phone" deal that recoups its cost through a 36-month bill credit look artificially cheap.

36-month total = Σ(monthly plan + monthly device) × 36 + Σ upfront − Σ trade-in/resale credit, computed per line and summed. Effective monthly is the 36-month total divided by 36 — it's a way to compare an unlocked-phone route (all cost upfront) against a financed route (cost spread over time) on the same footing, not a bill you'll actually see every month.

Device installments count only for the months they're actually billed — a 24-month plan adds 24 payments, not 36. "Buy unlocked (Apple financing)" routes pay the device through Apple Card Monthly Installments at the stated APR over its term, with nothing due upfront for the phone, and subtract Apple Card cashback on the device price once. Plan and fees are identical to the same carrier's pay-in-full unlocked route.

"Per person" is each line's own share of the 36-month total divided by 36 — its plan, its device, its activation and provider fees, net of its own trade-in or resale — not the household total split evenly. A line buying a new phone and a line keeping theirs show different figures, so the headline is a range when they differ.

Carrier plan prices come from the carrier's own FCC Broadband Facts label — the standardized price disclosure every carrier is legally required to publish, listing the monthly price, taxes, and fees in a fixed format. It's the same label you'd see linked in small print on a carrier's plan page, and it's the most reliable source we have because carriers can be held to it.

Device prices come from Apple's published MSRP. Trade-in and resale values come from the carrier's own trade-in program (for financed routes) or recent sold listings on resale marketplaces (for unlocked routes). When a promotion hasn't been announced yet, we don't invent a number — we either show a range bounded by the worst case, or mark the route unavailable and say why.

AT&T and Verizon's provider-fee figures come from FCC Broadband Facts labels filed in Pennsylvania, and those fees are driven by state and local surcharges — they'll be different in other states. We show the confirmed Pennsylvania figure rather than guess at your state's, and note it on every plan that carries one.

Every badge, range, and figure on the site uses one of exactly three confidence levels:

Open the carrier's FCC Broadband Facts label yourself and compare it to what we show. If something doesn't match, tell us — we'd rather fix a number than have you trust one that's wrong.