Well, it’s happened. After months of rumors and speculation, Google today launched its very own wireless service.
Called Project Fi, Google’s service aims to give users an easy-to-understand wireless experience that offers high-quality connections. Project Fi uses Sprint and T-Mobile’s 4G LTE networks as well as Wi-Fi to give you the best connection that’s available at a given time. When there’s a free Wi-Fi hotspot open, you’ll hop on there, but you’ll also have the option of connecting to Sprint or T-Mobile’s networks depending on which is offering the faster speeds.
When it comes time to sign up for Project Fi, you’ll start out with a $20 plan that includes unlimited talk and text, unlimited international text, low-cost international calling, Wi-Fi tethering, and coverage in more than 120 countries. You then add between 1GB and 10GB of data at a price of $10 per gigabyte. At the end of the month, Google will credit you for the data that you don’t use.
There are a couple of tidbits worth noting about traveling internationally with Project Fi. While the base plan includes unlimited international texting, you’ll need to pony up 20 cents per minute for international calls. And when it comes to data, you pay the same $10 per GB rate, but your data speeds will be limited to 256kbps.
Project Fi will only work with the Nexus 6 out of the gate, but Google says that once you sign up, you can attach your phone number with any device that supports Google Hangouts. That includes Android and iOS devices as well as Windows, Mac, and Chromebook computers. You can then use those devices to talk and text as normal.
So there’s Project Fi. If you’ve got a Nexus 6 and you’d like to give it a try, you can request an invitation to the service right now. Just hit up this link, sign in with your Google account, share your ZIP code, and you’re good to go.
Project Fi is Google’s new MVNO, but rather than lease out a single network like other MVNOs, Project Fi lets you hop between Sprint and T-Mobile and also let you use Wi-Fi (a la Republic Wireless). That’s pretty interesting, and while Sprint and T-Mobile may not have quite the coverage as AT&T and T-Mobile, the combination of Sprint, T-Mo, and Wi-Fi coverage should help keep users covered pretty well. And while Project Fi’s pricing isn’t particularly competitive, its unused data credits aren’t something that you often see.
Now that it’s officially official, what do you think of Project Fi? Are you going to request an invitation?
