Carrier Tethering With New AT&T Family Plans

[thatoneguy82]

First off, I tried searching for this and also the news thread about it, but for the life of me I couldn't find it. Also, tried googling and couldn't find it. This is regarding the new AT&T family plans that come with 10GB of shared data that starts at $130 for 2 lines/phone.

My question is this: With this new plan, is tethering enabled by default or is it an add-on?

Thanks!

 

[midnight555]

It is enabled by default.

 

[wordoflife]

Automatically shows up on your phone if you're on the plan.

 

[Ludatyk]

I switched about a month ago.. I was rather surprised to see it on my iPhone, but I haven't used it.

I also have a cellular iPad, but the hotspot for both device is really a non factor for me... I find it somewhat odd, for years... I was pleading for AT&T to enable hotspot.

Then I went to alternative means with jailbreaking, but now that I legitimately have it. Haven't found no use for it.. Weird.

 

[thatoneguy82]

Thanks!

Now, to ponder if I should switch to that plan. I have 2 lines: iPhone and a dumbphone. The dumb phone isn't really being used, so all 10GB would go to my iPhone. I'm paying $20/mo to VZW for my iPad and I can cancel that if I switch to this. Not really sure yet if it'll save me money or if I just break even, but with 10GB of data.

 

[PNutts]

You may already know that the iPad will be $10 on the AT&T plan. My wife has an iPad and we're going to cancel it's service because she always has her iPhone with her and will tether the iPad to it. Another $120/year in pocket.

 

[thatoneguy82]

You may already know that the iPad will be $10 on the AT&T plan. My wife has an iPad and we're going to cancel it's service because she always has her iPhone with her and will tether the iPad to it. Another $120/year in pocket.

I didn't, but it wouldn't matter to me as my iPad is a VZW one. But yes, I never just have my iPad, my phone is always with me. Though, the only "con" I can think of is the difference in service signal strength in a certain location. But, I doubt that applies anymore in my case since I live in Los Angeles; both AT&T and VZW have pretty much saturated this area.

 

[I7guy]

You may already know that the iPad will be $10 on the AT&T plan. My wife has an iPad and we're going to cancel it's service because she always has her iPhone with her and will tether the iPad to it. Another $120/year in pocket.

The issue is the battery life of the iPhone whilst tethering. I thought about the same thing but my iPad gets nine hours on cellular without a charge my iPhone clearly will need to be plugged in.

 

[deeddawg]

I didn't, but it wouldn't matter to me as my iPad is a VZW one.

Why wouldn't it? A Verizon iPad3 will work on AT&T.

I used the AT&T $25/90day/1GB prepaid plan on my Verizon iPad3. Just walked into an AT&T corporate store and asked for a prepaid micro SIM.

 

[dave420]

I'm paying $20/mo to VZW for my iPad and I can cancel that if I switch to this.

I also wanted to add that one advantage of paying for the Verizon service is that it is simply always on. If you like to get notifications or messages on your iPad you won't get them unless you are tethering or connected to WiFi. That might not matter to you if you are around WiFi a lot, but it may get inconvenient if you need to tether to your phone all the time.

As others have said you can pay $10 to AT&T to use the Verizon iPad on the mobile share plan without tethering.

 

[MacManTexas56]

I didn't, but it wouldn't matter to me as my iPad is a VZW one. But yes, I never just have my iPad, my phone is always with me. Though, the only "con" I can think of is the difference in service signal strength in a certain location. But, I doubt that applies anymore in my case since I live in Los Angeles; both AT&T and VZW have pretty much saturated this area.

i used to tether all the time, but found it to be such a PITA that i just sucked it up and got an AT&T air this time around. for $10....data is always on and i don't have to kill the battery on my iphone to get data. Plus, if you let the connection go idle for a few minutes it stops and you have to restart it. for only $10 more to have always on data...was totally worth it to me.

 

[robertpetry]

i used to tether all the time, but found it to be such a PITA that i just sucked it up and got an AT&T air this time around. for $10....data is always on and i don't have to kill the battery on my iphone to get data. Plus, if you let the connection go idle for a few minutes it stops and you have to restart it. for only $10 more to have always on data...was totally worth it to me.

Ditto. Exactly my experience.

 

[thatoneguy82]

Why wouldn't it? A Verizon iPad3 will work on AT&T.

Really? I didn't know this. Do I have to do anything special?

Also, the $10/month - how does this work? If I end up switching to the plan with 3 lines (iPhone, Dumb phone, iPad), will I still have to pay $10 additional for the iPad?