What Everybody Needs to Know About Straight Talk

You’ve seen the ads with the lime green background ” $45 a month for unlimited talk, text and data with Walmart’s Straight Talk Wireless plan.

The average monthly cell phone bill is $71 a month, according to J.D. Power & Associates. For a family of four, each with a smartphone, that phone bill can be more than $200 a month. So for average cellphone users, the savings they will see by switching to Straight Talk Wireless can add up to $312 or more a year.

Straight Talk Wireless will include a free phone when you sign up. But that phone would be a painfully steep downgrade from the iPhone or Android you are currently using. The good news is that Straight Talk allows you to bring your own phone, as long as it meets their requirements.

Phones I Can Use with Straight Talk

The phone you bring to use with Straight Talk needs to be GSM- or CDMA-compatible. Whether a phone is GSM- or CDMA-compatible depends on what carrier issued the phone. For example, AT&T is CDMA-compatible, and Verizon is GSM-compatible. The way to know for sure which type of phone you have is to remove your phone’s battery and look underneath for a SIM card. If there’s a SIM card, you have a GSM phone. If there is no SIM card, you now know that your phone is CDMA-compatible. We also highly recommend you search for current and working Straight Talk promo codes so that you can truly maximize the savings on your phone plan.

It’s a lot simpler to switch phones on GSM networks because of the removable SIM card. If you plan to use your unlocked GSM phone with Straight Talk, you just need to make sure it operates on frequencies that are compatible with Straight Talk’s frequencies (850 and 1900 MHz). But the general rule is that if you have a phone with a SIM card, you are good to go with Straight Talk. Other companies like Verizon offer similar plans but they just aren’t the same thing.

Phones without a SIM card need to have permission from the original phone carrier in order to switch. To find out if your phone company cooperates, you need to go to the Straight Talk website and enter in your phone’s serial number and other information. They will let you know if you can use your phone with the Straight Talk Wireless service.

The phones you can use with Straight Talk are pretty much any unlocked GSM phone. If your phone does not have a SIM card, you may still be able to use it with Straight Talk, but you will need to check with Straight Talk first to know for sure.