Is there ANY reason to stay with T-mobile?

I currently pay $58 with Tmo (including tax) for 1G of high speed data. The same would cost ~$35 with Fi, plus I get high speed overseas (I have to pay for it, but I'm happy to).

Tmo's overseas data is convenient - when it works. Speed is usually terrible.

I wonder if Fi's domestic coverage is better or worse than Tmo's. I would think while it combines 3 carriers' coverage, it probably has lower priority on each one. Tmo is terrible when driving between cities.

I couldn't see any. That's why the Pixel phone is on pre-order with Fi SIM. I pay $52 per month for 3 GB of data with Tmo (I'm on an older much better plan than you it seems). So for me, the same 3 GB will actually be about the same - although the reality is I will (i) be getting significantly faster speeds when traveling and (ii) will save in months when I don't use 3 GB (which are many).

Unless you stream a lot of youtube in the US... with binge on, it is free with T-mobile.

Not for that price there isn't any reason to stay with T-Mo.

Fi allegedly has the same priority as postpaid on all three of its carriers. It definitely has better coverage than T-Mobile alone when you get out of town. The only issue I had is that it would occasionally sit on a crappy Sprint signal when there was perfectly good, fast T-Mobile LTE available. Using an app like Signal Spy, you can kick it over to whichever network manually when necessary.

Thanks for the tip about Signal Spy. Will have to try to remember to install it when my Pixel arrives.

thanks for the data points.

Is it possible buy a phone from Fi without activating service? I want the 6P and I must get it from Fi in order to qualify for WF cell phone insurance's requirement of getting it directly from "a cellular service provider’s retail or Internet store".

EDIT - could I: order phone and service from Fi (choose to transfer # from my current carrier), but before I turn on the phone, switch to my current carrier (Tmo)'s SIM card, then Fi service will never be activated, and I won't be charged for any Fi service. Would that work?

Of course. The phones you buy from the Google Store are unlocked and you can use them with other SIMs, including Tmo. I use my current Nexus 5 with TMo.

What's the best way to get Fi Service on my unlocked iPhone 7+ without easy access to an Android device?

Take a look at this thread, post #21 before you try to use a non-Google phone: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...-phones-2.html

There really isn't one since you need one of the supported Android devices in order to activate your service. I just chalked it up as the cost of using the service and bought a 5X that just sits mostly unused.

So far I have used Fi to roam internationally twice:

4 days in Victoria, BC: worked fine

Peru: effectively did not work. ~10 days the majority of which was in Lima or Cusco and could never get it to "hold" a data connection. When coming out of airplane mode, I would get the LTE indicator (Nexus 6P) and usable data for about 30-90 seconds, then data dropped out and the service indicator changed to a hollow triangle. I could toggle airplane mode on/off again and get another 30-90 seconds, but ANGTFT.

Exacerbating this was the fact that hotel wifi seemed utterly crappy even in nicer hotels, individual SSIDs per floor that regularly cut in and out, and poor throughput (especially upload bandwidth). Had much better luck with wifi in cafes/restaurants.

The Reddit results in a Google search for "google fi peru" suggest this may be a problem with the underlying T-Mobile connectivity in Peru.

Overall I'm pretty happy with Fi though, paying much less than I was previously and that was already a heavily-discounted Sprint employee-rate plan from a friend-of-a-friend.

They now have group plan, $15 per additional line. Data same rate as $10 per Gb. So it is $5 cheaper per month on each line.

https://blog.google/products/project...is-group-plan/

If they really push this Pixel thing, including through Verizon and maybe other carriers, how long will they stick with Fi?

Hope it doesn't turn into one of their other projects that they abandon or half-... like Google Fiber.

I thought I'd chime in as a happy Fi customer, who falls on the lower end of cell phone savviness (prior to Fi, I was a long-time customer of Virgin Mobile, which meant I had both a crummy phone and network.) I've never bothered to root a phone, and I've merrily traveled internationally without a working cell phone at all.

So, that said, Fi is great. I'm very pleased with the Nexus 5X. My main concern, which has been completely unwarranted, was battery life. I often don't need to charge it in the evenings. I love the lack of various carrier bloatware.I've had no issues with the network in the U.S. I have upcoming travel to South America and Europe, so hope all goes smoothly there (but if not, well, I'm used to not having a working phone anyway.) My bill is $10 less than with Virgin Mobile, which was already cheap to begin with, as I used a whopping 0.2GB of data last month, as I'm almost always near wifi.

In other words, I've had the sense the Fi was maybe being marketed to a more tech-oriented or interested consumer. But I'm very pleased and would happily recommend it to befuddled or cheapskate friends. So I hope Google doesn't abandon it...