iD Mobile Review 2019: Get the UK’s lowest price SIM for only £3.99 a month!

Mar 26th, 2019

Half Cooked’s overall rating for ID: (4 / 5)

Summary

iD Mobile have strong SIM and phone contract deals that are priced competitively versus anything else you will find in the market, with their deals starting as low as £3.99 a month. They offer a range of handsets with phone contract deals starting from £6.99 rising to your top end Apple & Samsung handsets.

At the same time as offering competitive pricing iD Mobile also offer customers perks such as Wi-Fi calling and data rollover schemes which make them a great value proposition.

However, you won’t be getting some of the additional perks you would with some of the larger networks which are now offering things such as inclusive entertainment subscriptions to popular applications such as Apple Music or unlimited streaming with Netflix.

To sum up, if you aren’t worried about the extras and want good network coverage and data speeds as well as data rollover and Wi-Fi calling, whilst paying some of the cheapest prices in the market, iD Mobile is the network for you.

Click here to go direct to iD Mobile’s website and see their latest SIM offers.

Skip to the half cooked breakdown to find out how iD performed in each of our main categories by clicking here.

Otherwise read on for our full review or skip to a specific section from choosing from the table of contents below.

Table of Contents

Network Basics

Network Coverage & Data Speeds (4 / 5)

iD mobile is owned by the popular high street mobile phone retailer Carphone Warehouse however it runs on Three’s network so as an iD mobile customer you will be getting the same 4G speeds and network coverage as a Three customer.

Per Open Signal for H1 2018 Three is only behind EE in terms of data speeds with an average download speed on 4G of 23 MB/s vs EE who leads the way with 29MB/s.

Three despite winning the uSwitch Mobile 2017 award for ‘The best network for data’ voted for by consumers fell behind giffgaff in 2018.

The network coverage you will get on your iD mobile SIM is 99.8% 4G coverage and 98.3% 3G coverage. If you have ever had a Three SIM and received good coverage in your area you will get the same with your ID Mobile SIM and if not, they have a coverage checker on their site which you can access by clicking here.

Voice Call Quality (3 / 5)

Running on the Three network we can look to their recent performances on call quality tests to understand the call service quality you will get with your iD mobile SIM.

Three only operates on the 3G & 4G network and does not use any 2G spectrum. Three offers 4G super voice which means increased indoor and rural coverage. This means users can make calls in areas they couldn’t before and signals are stronger than ever. The faster data speeds mean information can be sent faster and better call clarity. To have access to this you need to ensure your phone is 4G compatible.

However, looking at tests run by P3 communications, an independent testing body who have widely been accepted as authoritative and highly objective, Three came third out of the major operators with a score of ‘good’ with call connection times being the main reason for tracking behind EE and Vodafone. Considerably longer call set up times were observed in larger cities – about 1.5 seconds longer.

Tethering (1 / 5)

Tethering is using the data on your mobile SIM to connect other Wi-Fi enabled devices to the internet. This is something offered by the majority of network providers which gives users the freedom of using their data how they want but unfortunately this isn’t something offered by iD mobile.

iD are likely not offering tethering to limit data usage to be able to price their plans so competitively but this is disappointing as a number of their direct rivals such as SMARTY & giffgaff offer comparative prices but do offer tethering.

International Roaming (3 / 5)

With the change to EU regulations in June 2017 all networks that offer international roaming must have EU destinations included as part of their regular plan usage so with iD Mobile you can rest assured any of your usage in the EU is covered.

However, some of the other providers are now offering additional countries above and beyond EU destinations. Three with their ‘Go Roam’ proposition and O2 with ‘O2 Travel’ now offer over 20 additional international countries where you can use your plan minutes, texts and data as per normal. But none of iD mobiles direct competitors (at their lower price point) offer anything close to Three or O2’s plans which generally only have these additional destinations in the higher price plans.

ID do include a few additional countries in their roaming proposition which are Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan or Macedonia although they aren’t the most popular holiday destinations!

Wi-Fi Calling & Wi-Fi Hotspots (2 / 5)

Wi-Fi calling allows customers to place calls and send texts using wireless networks instead of using their 3G/4G network. This is a great perk if you find yourself in an indoor blackspot but have access to Wi-Fi.

iD Mobile unlike several of the other lower-cost MVNO’s does offer Wi-Fi calling. This is a great perk to have and is generally only found among your larger, more expensive operators which helps separate iD from the pack.

However, when it comes to Wi-Fi hotspots you won’t find any with iD Mobile. Wi-Fi hotspots are great for users trying to save on their data usage, O2 do a great job of this offering its phone and SIM customers over 7,000 Wi-Fi spots in the UK.

Again, you will find that networks offering the SIM pricing of iD won’t have a lot of these useful perk but these days many public places such as restaurants and airports now offer free Wi-Fi so you may find that this won’t be an issue.

Data Rollover (3 / 5)

Data rollover means you can roll your unused data from one month to the next. For e.g. if you have a 2GB plan and only use 1GB the following month you will have 3GB as the extra 1GB would be rolled over.

iD Mobile offers data rollover to its customers – any unused data is rolled over to the following month. However, any data you don’t use in the month it is rolled over to is lost by the end of the month. Other networks such as Sky offer rollover for up to 3 years and SMARTY takes data rollover one step further and offers customers money off their next bill for any unused data. This is a unique offer for SMARTY SIM customers so although a good perk for iD Mobile users definitely not the strongest in the market.

Spending Caps (4 / 5)

Spending caps are a great way to control your monthly phone bill and to prevent any nasty surprises come the end of the month.

iD mobile offer ShockProof which is bill capping so their customers don’t have any bill shocks. You can choose an out of plan cap between £0-£25 and iD will prevent you from exceeding this cap for the month and if your spending habits change you can adjust your bill cap at any time using the iD mobile app.

Customer Rewards (1 / 5)

With the high level of competition in the market and several very competitive plans at different price points some of the network operators are now offering loyalty schemes and rewards to as a tool to hold onto their customers. O2 Priority leads the way as the strongest in the market where you can get free coffee’s, cheap meal deals, discounts at top high street brands and first access to gig tickets on a weekly basis.

Unfortunately, this isn’t something currently offered by iD Mobile, attracting customers looking for low cost SIM plans is still iD Mobiles primary target but they may need to start offering other rewards with other low cost networks such as SMARTY introducing rewards such as offering free months for referrals.

Multi Buy Discounts/ Family Plans (1 / 5)

Some networks are now offering customers discounts on any additional SIM or phone contract purchases they make to incentivise people to sign up their family & friends.

With iD Mobile SIM & Phone plans being really competitively price – starting at £3.99 there isn’t much room for additional discounts by way of a family plan or shared plan.

Although you won’t get a family plan with iD Mobile, with their low pricing you may find your families total monthly bill would be cheaper regardless.

Other Perks (1 / 5)

Several networks have started to offer inclusive entertainment packages & free data streaming as an incentive for customers to join.

Inclusive entertainment packages are something currently not offered by iD. Again, this perk is not offered by any of the lower cost MVNO’s to remain competitive at their price point

You also won’t find any free social media streaming such as that with Three’s ‘Go Binge’ proposition which helps you save significant data on popular apps such as Netflix & Apple Music.

iD not having many of these perks is the reason they can offer the value they do, but if they’re important perks to you then iD may not be your 1st choice.

SIM Deals

iD Mobile Offer Phone contracts, SIM only contracts & PAYG all with 4G.

SIM only deals start from £3.99. This is a basic plan for very low data users coming with 150 minutes & 500MB of data, all plans come with unlimited texts, and go up to £20 which gets you unlimited minutes & 20GB of data.

In terms of phone contracts iD Mobile offer all their deals on 24 month contracts and these range from low end handsets which start at £6.99 all the way to your high end iPhone’s & Samsung’s. Being contracts as opposed to a finance arrangement as is with Sky Mobile & GiffGaff it is generally easier to get a handset with iD Mobile.

iD Mobile also offer PAYG plans – which you can either use by topping up and paying 3p per minute, 2p per text and 1p per MB of data or purchase 1 or 3 monthly bundles which offer 30 day bundles at a better value than the PAYG plans. If you order a PAYG SIM it will come pre-loaded with a bundle which once you have used it up you can purchase another or pay per min, text & MB.

Half Cooked Overall Breakdown

Half Cooked’s overall rating for iD:  (3 / 5)

 

• Network Coverage and Speeds – iD runs on the Three network which has 99.8% 4G coverage and some of the quickest data speeds in the market second only to EE.
• Voice Call Quality – P3 Comms rated voice call quality as ‘Good’ with the main issue being longer call set up times than other networks.
• Tethering – iD Mobile try to save on data usage by not offering tethering despite this being common in the market
• International Roaming — iD Mobile try to save on data usage by not offering tethering despite this being common in the market
• Wi-Fi Calling & Wi-Fi Hotspots – Wi-Fi calling available for indoor blackspots but nor Wi-Fi hotpots available.
• Data Rollover Data rollover available with iD Mobile however only one month rollover after which you lose your data.
• Spending Caps – ShockProof means you won’t get any bill shocks & can control how much you spend every month.
• Customer Rewards – No customer rewards available at the moment for iD customers.
• Multi Buy Discounts/ Family Plans – There are no family plans available to iD Mobile customers due to already highly competitive pricing.
• Other Perks – Competitive data deals for iD customers means no extra perks such as inclusive entertainment packages.