Ultimately, Tracfone will do whatever Tracfone wants to do. How and what that will be is anyone's guess.
But there are a LOT of MVNOs in the marketplace, and canceling the $50/365 day service option means that those alternate choices become a lot more attractive to those Tracfone customers that have light usage requirements.
For myself, and, I suspect, a lot of other Tracfone customers like me, Tracfone's $50 annual service option always tipped the total annual cost in Tracfone's favor. Taking that option away will mean that other low cost carriers, Mint and Red Pocket for example, will be able to poach many of those of us that are Annual Bottom Line customers.
Great article as always. I just would like to add tracfones latest offering: 1200 min, 1200 texts, 3 GB data, & 1 yr of service for $50 on ebay. This is advertised as a limited-time offer, but from what i've gathered will be a permanent addition at $60. Of course, this would probably also mean the the end of the $125 card as we know it.. Thankfully. Some of us have bought phone bundles mainly for the deal on service additions. https://www.ebay.com/itm/Tracfone-Prepaid-Wireless-Smartphone-Plan-SIM-1200-Min-1200-Txt-3GB-Data-/283448464240
June 13, 2019 at 9:39 PM
Anonymous said...
The 365 service days for $49 still seem to appear as an add-on purchase once you begin the checkout process.
June 14, 2019 at 10:53 AM
Anonymous said...
On June 8, 2019, I added the 90-day card onto my plan and was able to extend the 365 additional days for $49.99. I went through the process again tonight and found that I can still add on the 365 days for $49.99.
I think the option is available for all TracFone-branded phones. I had just purchased an iPhone from TracFone when I made the purchase. Previously, I was not given that option on my BYOP LG G3. What I would like to know is whether it would still be considered as TracFone-branded if I were to sell it to someone else.
I was disappointed that Tracfone no longer offers 365 days of airtime for ~$50. I'm thrilled to learn about the ebay plan for $49.99 that includes 3 GH of data, 1200 minutes, 1200 texts, and 365 days of service. I just bout it from "Direct from Tracfone". Before buying it I called Tracfone's customer service to confirm that it can be used on my BYO Smartphone plan. Maria asked me for my cell phone number and confirmed that I will be able to use the eBay Smartphone Card. I received an email from Tracfone confirming the purchase. It also includes a sim card (which I will not need). I ordered this on 6/25/19. The email says I should get delivery by Friday, July 5. With CA sales tax the total cost was $53.86.
Thanks Shasta for your helpful information about the eBay offer. I just bought it. I may or may not have made a boo boo. I ordered it to work on ATT, which I later learned will include a new SIM. I probably should have ordered it as an existing customer. The possible boo boo may be that the card will need to be activated (only?) with the new SIM. I'll follow up after July 5th when my order is scheduled to arrive.
This is a much better deal than the $125 365 day smart phone card.
June 25, 2019 at 6:46 PM
Anonymous said...
Moderator(s), Thanks to Shasta's posting about this above, I purchased the exclusive $49.99 deal on eBay that includes 3 GB, 1200 minutes, 1200 texts, 365 days of service, and (may, if you so choose) include a new SIM. Here's a link, https://www.ebay.com/itm/Tracfone-Prepaid-Wireless-Smartphone-Plan-SIM-1200-Min-1200-Txt-3GB-Data/283448464240?var=&hash=item41fed85370 This great deal seems to deserve a write up to let more people learn about it. It's good for new or renewal TracFone customers.
For what it's worth, I bought one of the $50. tracfone year cards on e-bay for my mom and it worked fine. Seems like a good deal, will do it for my phone, which I usually buy form QVC or HSN on an almost yearly basis because of getting a phone and minutes has always seemed like the most cost effective option. I use your site to make decisions when buying phones, thanks!
September 2, 2019 at 10:56 AM
Tracfone Offers Talk Add on Card - Is it a Good Deal?
Analysis of the new talk add-on card by TracfoneReviewer.
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Tracfone talk add-on card
Ever wish you could add just extra talk minutes to your phone? Well now you can with Tracfone introducing a talk add-on card!
The new card adds extra talk minutes but no additional text/data or service days. With Tracfone smartphones, airtime is split into talk, text and data buckets and consumers have long asked for a talk add-on card to add just additional talk minutes.
Tracfone already offers both a Text Only Card and the Data Only Card and you can follow the links to see more details and a cost breakdown.
How Many Talk Minutes do you get from the Add-on Card?
Here is where things get a little interesting. With the Text and Data add-on cards, they are only available for smartphones. But Tracfone offers a talk add-on card for both basic phones and smartphones. However, the basic phone talk add on is just 100 minutes while the smartphone add-on is 500 talk minutes.
We haven't tested if the basic phone card will triple, but it seems likely that it will, so that would be 300 talk minutes for $10 which is still not as much as the smartphone add-on amount.
Is the Talk Add-on Card a Good Deal?
Let's look at the cost breakdown of the smartphone talk add-on:
Smartphone talk add-on is 2 Cents per Minute. (500 Min/$10)
At 2 Cents per minute the talk add-on card lines up with the other add-on cards and is a pretty good value. It also makes it easy to breakdown the cost of the other smartphone cards which we have done below:
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Tracfone Smartphone Card Cost Breakdown
What the table above shows is that certain smartphone cards are a better 'value' than others, specifically the $20 smartphone card. We also see that certain cards are not as good of a value, such as the $45 smartphone card and $125 smartphone card. However, it all really depends on how much talk, text and data you use.
To determine which cards are the best value, we broke up the value of talk, text, data and service days from each of the cards based on the cost of the add-on cards ($10 for 500 talk, $10 for 1000 MB data, $5 for 1000 texts and $5 for 30 service days) and then added the those numbers together to get the 'actual value' of the cards.
Note: Tracfone seems to have removed their service day add-on card which gave 365 service days for $50. We're not sure if they have removed this for good, or if they will be releasing it again, with perhaps an adjusted price.
With the $20 smartphone card, you are essentially getting $26 worth of airtime for $20.
Overall we consider the talk add-on toe be a good deal, especially for those who just need additional calling minutes. We also hope to see Tracfone promo codes for it in the near future like we already have for the text and data cards which make those an even better deal.
Where to Buy the Talk Add-on Card
Currently the talk add-on card is only available on the Tracfone website in the add-on section. You will need to select if you are using a basic phone or smartphone, or enter your phone number before seeing the card selections.
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Get the Talk add-on from the Tracfone website
That concludes our guide to the new Talk add-on from Tracfone. If you have any additional thoughts or questions, leave a comment below.
If you're shopping for a smartphone, be sure to check out our List of the Best Tracfone Smartphones in 2019, which includes some of best current smartphones available from Tracfone. Additionally, our list of the Latest Tracfone Smartphones has all of the most recent releases to browse as well.
Keep up with the latest Tracfone news, info, deals and tips by joining over 2500 others who Follow us on Facebook! It is also a great place to ask questions!
10 Comments
Close this window Jump to comment formUltimately, Tracfone will do whatever Tracfone wants to do. How and what that will be is anyone's guess.
But there are a LOT of MVNOs in the marketplace, and canceling the $50/365 day service option means that those alternate choices become a lot more attractive to those Tracfone customers that have light usage requirements.
For myself, and, I suspect, a lot of other Tracfone customers like me, Tracfone's $50 annual service option always tipped the total annual cost in Tracfone's favor. Taking that option away will mean that other low cost carriers, Mint and Red Pocket for example, will be able to poach many of those of us that are Annual Bottom Line customers.
Who knows? Maybe that's what Tracfone wants!
June 13, 2019 at 9:06 PM
Great article as always. I just would like to add tracfones latest offering: 1200 min, 1200 texts, 3 GB data, & 1 yr of service for $50 on ebay. This is advertised as a limited-time offer, but from what i've gathered will be a permanent addition at $60. Of course, this would probably also mean the the end of the $125 card as we know it.. Thankfully. Some of us have bought phone bundles mainly for the deal on service additions. https://www.ebay.com/itm/Tracfone-Prepaid-Wireless-Smartphone-Plan-SIM-1200-Min-1200-Txt-3GB-Data-/283448464240
June 13, 2019 at 9:39 PM
The 365 service days for $49 still seem to appear as an add-on purchase once you begin the checkout process.
June 14, 2019 at 10:53 AM
On June 8, 2019, I added the 90-day card onto my plan and was able to extend the 365 additional days for $49.99. I went through the process again tonight and found that I can still add on the 365 days for $49.99.
I think the option is available for all TracFone-branded phones. I had just purchased an iPhone from TracFone when I made the purchase. Previously, I was not given that option on my BYOP LG G3. What I would like to know is whether it would still be considered as TracFone-branded if I were to sell it to someone else.
June 21, 2019 at 10:03 PM
Does Tracfone offer service days only?
June 25, 2019 at 10:50 AM
I was disappointed that Tracfone no longer offers 365 days of airtime for ~$50. I'm thrilled to learn about the ebay plan for $49.99 that includes 3 GH of data, 1200 minutes, 1200 texts, and 365 days of service. I just bout it from "Direct from Tracfone". Before buying it I called Tracfone's customer service to confirm that it can be used on my BYO Smartphone plan. Maria asked me for my cell phone number and confirmed that I will be able to use the eBay Smartphone Card. I received an email from Tracfone confirming the purchase. It also includes a sim card (which I will not need). I ordered this on 6/25/19. The email says I should get delivery by Friday, July 5. With CA sales tax the total cost was $53.86.
June 25, 2019 at 6:26 PM
Thanks Shasta for your helpful information about the eBay offer. I just bought it. I may or may not have made a boo boo. I ordered it to work on ATT, which I later learned will include a new SIM. I probably should have ordered it as an existing customer. The possible boo boo may be that the card will need to be activated (only?) with the new SIM. I'll follow up after July 5th when my order is scheduled to arrive.
This is a much better deal than the $125 365 day smart phone card.
June 25, 2019 at 6:46 PM
Moderator(s), Thanks to Shasta's posting about this above, I purchased the exclusive $49.99 deal on eBay that includes 3 GB, 1200 minutes, 1200 texts, 365 days of service, and (may, if you so choose) include a new SIM. Here's a link, https://www.ebay.com/itm/Tracfone-Prepaid-Wireless-Smartphone-Plan-SIM-1200-Min-1200-Txt-3GB-Data/283448464240?var=&hash=item41fed85370 This great deal seems to deserve a write up to let more people learn about it. It's good for new or renewal TracFone customers.
June 28, 2019 at 2:20 PM
Anyone know if we can add a promo code to activating that eBay 3GB deal?
August 26, 2019 at 6:13 PM
For what it's worth, I bought one of the $50. tracfone year cards on e-bay for my mom and it worked fine. Seems like a good deal, will do it for my phone, which I usually buy form QVC or HSN on an almost yearly basis because of getting a phone and minutes has always seemed like the most cost effective option. I use your site to make decisions when buying phones, thanks!
September 2, 2019 at 10:56 AM