Are the cheap networks actually worse?
Answered 28 June 2026 · reading time about 3 minutes
“My daughter is on giffgaff and pays half what I pay. Is she getting a worse signal than me, or am I simply being overcharged?”
— A.B., Dundee
Only four companies own mobile masts in Britain: EE, O2, Three and Vodafone. Everyone else rents wholesale and resells the same radio waves under their own name. So the question is never “is this network worse?” — it is “whose masts am I actually buying, and what did the discount remove?”
Which one suits which reader
If you want the cheapest way to test a big network
giffgaff for O2, SMARTY for Three, 1pMobile for EE. One rolling month on the tenant tells you exactly what the landlord's signal does at your address, for pocket money and with nothing to unwind.
If you shop at Tesco anyway
Tesco Mobile has a long record for plain pricing and family discounts, with Clubcard-linked hooks that genuinely reduce the bill for regular shoppers. Perks are lighter than O2's own Priority, and the newest 5G tiers can arrive later.
If you hate phone menus
giffgaff runs entirely online and through its member community — no shops, no call centres. If that suits you, the savings are real. If you want a person on the phone when something breaks, look elsewhere.
If you ring family abroad
Lebara bundles generous international minutes into cheap rolling plans on Vodafone's masts. Diary the date any introductory price steps up, and check the country list matches the countries you actually ring.
If you live on social apps
VOXI exempts selected social and video apps from the allowance, which can effectively double your usable data. Confirm today's exempt list — it evolves — and note that Vodafone is a different landlord from the four we cover in detail, so run its coverage check separately.
If you barely use your phone
1pMobile charges by the unit on EE's masts. For genuinely light users this is the cheapest arrangement in the country; for anyone heavy, per-unit billing gets expensive fast.
Four checks before buying from any tenant
Got a question of your own?
We answer readers, not customers. Nothing here is for sale, we can't see your account, and we will never ask for a security code.
020 3475 9516WhatsAppThis site sets one essential cookie plus anonymous visit counts — see the cookie policy.