FreedomPop Hub Burst - Free Broadband?

FreedomPop Hub Burst

Summary

Pros

• ~$100 for the router, 1 GB free data per month
• Potential to earn more free data by completing referrals
• No contract; month-to-month billing

Cons

• FreedomPop currently uses the Clearwire network
• Seem to be using up data very quickly
• Must purchase FreedomPop devices for service

The FreedomPop homepage.

Introduction

Below are some of my general experiences with FreedomPop. More detailed reviews will be published in upcoming articles.

Wild FreedomPop Appeared!

Discussion

FreedomPop is a MVNO that operates on the Clearwire network (plans to expand to the Sprint network are set for sometime in 2013). It offers users either home or mobile internet; FreedomPop requires separate accounts with separate credit cards are required for each device in order to monitor usage for each device.

Home Internet, I choose you!

Mobile users can get 500 MB/month free, while home users get 1 GB/month free. Extra data is billed on a per megabit basis, with prices varying depending on the type of service and plan you end up getting.

I applaud the idea behind FreedomPop, but I definitely think that there is room for improvement. Trying to connect to the Clearwire network is extremely frustrating; I need to stand next to the window or outdoors to even get a weak signal. Also, I appear to be using data at an alarming rate: at this pace, the total will definitely be more than what the free amount is. I will do a side-by-side comparison, visiting the same websites on my mobile phone first on Ting, then on FreedomPop, to get some good comparative data.

Conclusion

FreedomPop definitely has an interesting idea in offering internet as a freemium service. I think it works great as a way to supplement my work phone—more details to follow in future articles—but because FreedomPop currently uses the Clearwire network, and my experiments seem to indicate rapid data usage, I can't recommend it at this time. I'll continue to measure my data usage and post an update when it becomes available.

My data usage on FreedomPop. Good thing I received my router late in the month: after only a three days of light usage (a few minutes of website browsing and emailing each day, no streaming videos or music), I've used up 147 MB. At this rate, I'd reach the 1GB limit on free data in 20.4 days.