Shopping for a new internet service provider that offers competitive pricing, fast speeds and doesn’t require you to sign on the dotted line can be overwhelming. We’ve got you covered.
What’s the best no-contract internet provider overall?
CNET’s pick for the best overall no-contract internet is Google Fiber. With consistent speeds (two plans of 1,000 and 2,000 megabits per second available in all serviceable areas and even faster speeds in select areas) and no equipment fees, it stands out among the competition. That said, Google Fiber has limited availability across the country. If you’re not in one of the 19 states where it operates, don’t worry: You’ll still be in great shape if you can access AT&T Fiber or any of the other providers we list below.
One bit of business first: Just because you don’t have to sign a term agreement doesn’t always mean you’re getting the best price. Some providers will put a premium on their pay-as-you-go plans while their contract rates will be much cheaper. To help keep your costs in perspective, we noted the cost per Mbps for each listed no-contract internet provider. It’s an excellent way to compare apples to apples.
Best no-contract internet service providers of 2024
1,000 – 8,000 Mbps
$70 – $150 per month
Our take – At first glance, Google Fiber plans seem expensive. There are five options: the cheapest at $70 per month and the most expensive at $150 monthly. These plans offer speeds from 1 gigabit (1,000Mbps) to 8 gigabits (8,000Mbps), so the actual cost per Mbps is 7 and 2 cents, respectively, which is excellent. You’re getting a fast connection for your money. On top of that, your equipment is included in your monthly price, which is a great deal.
1,000 – 8,000 Mbps
$70 – $150 per month
100 – 1,500 Mbps
$20 – $80 per month
Our take – This cable internet provider boasts some of the best pricing out of the gates. It has quite a range of pricing across its various markets — including Austin, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, New York City, Philadelphia, San Antonio, San Francisco, Seattle and others. Still, it has an aggressively competitive average cost of 5 cents per Mbps for the promo price. In many markets, you’ll find a 300Mbps plan for $20 per month. That’s excellent. That tough-to-beat price for cable internet falls closer to the pack after your introductory period, as the average cost jumps to 30 cents per Mbps. You’ll be hard-pressed to find a better price for your initial years of service.
100 – 1,500 Mbps
$20 – $80 per month
10 – 140 Mbps
$55 per month
Our take – There is no need to worry about cancellation fees on any CenturyLink plan — none of them come with any contractual commitments. The value is pretty strong with CenturyLink, too — the company’s DSL plans offer a fixed value rate of $55 a month, which is hard to beat among DSL offerings.
10 – 140 Mbps
$55 per month
300 – 1,000 Mbps
$50 – $80 per month
Our take – Spectrum is as straightforward as you can get when looking at cable internet providers. There are three plans: 300Mbps, 500Mbps and 1 Gig, and all are free of contracts and data caps. Across all three, the average cost per Mbps in the first year is 12 cents, which is quite good for cable internet. Perhaps more impressive, the second-year jump isn’t too steep (for an ISP, anyway), up to an average of 20 cents per Mbps.
300 – 1,000 Mbps
$50 – $80 per month
100 – 1,000 Mbps
$40 – $70 per month
Our take – In many suburban and rural areas where it often competes with satellite providers (most of which require a two-year contract), Kinetic by Windstream sets itself apart by ditching term agreements altogether. You can get either DSL (a majority of its footprint) or fiber service (currently about one-fifth of its network) for an average cost of 12 cents per Mbps during the first year.
100 – 1,000 Mbps
$40 – $70 per month
300 – 5,000 Mbps
$55 – $250 per month
Our take – Available to approximately a third of its footprint, AT&T Fiber plans provide excellent value. Five different plan options (300, 500 and 1,000Mbps, as well as 2 and 5 gigabits) range in price from $55 to $245 per month, with no data caps or contracts. Altogether, AT&T’s fiber plans average just over 10 cents per Mbps, which is solid. Even more spectacular are the multi-gigabit plans, which average out to under 7 cents per Mbps, which is excellent.
300 – 5,000 Mbps
$55 – $250 per month
300 – 2,000 Mbps
$50 – $120 per month
Our take – Verizon Fios, the company’s fiber-optic internet option, doesn’t require contracts for its home internet plans. Additionally, it scores high customer satisfaction marks in every ISP survey. It nabbed the top spot in a recent broadband survey and always does well in the annual American Customer Satisfaction Index report, scoring 77 out of 100 points, six points above the industry average. Verizon Fios did equally well in the 2023 J.D. Power ISP study by grabbing the highest score in the East region for the 10th consecutive year.
300 – 2,000 Mbps
$50 – $120 per month
Additional no-contract internet providers to consider
- Cox Communications: There’s flexibility here, but it comes at a cost. Cox doesn’t require you to sign a contract to receive internet service, but it does encourage customers to sign a two-year agreement. Cox also offers low-cost internet options, which feature no contracts and no credit checks or deposits. The ConnectAssist plan is priced at $30 a month for 100Mbps in download speeds and comes with a free modem. For that streamlined approach, you’ll pay 30 cents per Mbps, which is better than the average of all other plans Cox offers but doesn’t give you any options for faster download speeds.
- Frontier Communications: You won’t have to worry about binding contracts if you can access Frontier Internet (DSL) or Frontier Fiber. In addition to that, equipment fees are included in the monthly price, too. Customers of Frontier Fiber will see an average cost of 38 cents per Mbps for first-year pricing, while DSL customers can expect to pay $2.60 per Mbps.
- Mediacom: Though you’ll need to contend with data caps, Mediacom’s Xtream internet selections do not require you to sign a long-term contract. Across all three plans, you can expect to pay an average of 8 cents per Mbps during your first year; after that, the average cost per Mbps jumps to 56 cents.
- Metronet: This Midwest fiber-optic internet provider serves 15 states across the country. No term contracts are required for any plans, but an additional $15 monthly equipment fee might apply for some plans. The promo prices are decent, especially for its gigabit plan, which is a nifty 6 cents per Mbps for six months. The average cost per Mbps of its regular rates is 19 cents, which is fair but nothing special.
- Optimum: All Optimum plans feature no data caps, no contracts and some of the best promo pricing for cable internet. Your first-year pricing will feature an average cost per Mbps of 11 cents. After 12 months, the average cost per Mbps jumps to 17 cents.
- Rise Broadband: This fixed wireless internet provider offers download speeds from 25Mbps to 1,000Mbps. While most of the plans include unlimited data, the two cheaper options either come with a 250GB data cap or require an additional $10 for unlimited data. Rise’s introductory prices vary by location, but the average cost per Mbps in the first year can be between $1 and $2.20.
- Sparklight: Sparklight offers affordable introductory plans in select rural areas across the country. Across the four plans, you can expect to pay an average of 17 cents per Mbps. Once the promo period ends, that average cost per Mbps jumps up to 23 cents, which isn’t a terribly expensive increase in prices for a rural provider. Note that Sparklight enforces a soft cap of 5TB, so there’s the potential for additional fees if you exceed your monthly limits.
- Starlink: Elon Musk’s budding internet service is unique among satellite internet providers because it doesn’t require a contract. Also, the average cost per Mbps of its standard plan (100Mbps) is just over $1, which is excellent for that connection type. The priority plan, which offers max speeds of 220Mbps, drops the average cost per Mbps to six cents. That’s pretty impressive for an internet technology known to fall on the pricier side. Starlink still requires a bit of a commitment: you must make a one-time equipment purchase of $499 (or a sizable $2,500 if you’re purchasing the priority plans). That’s a sizable chunk of change that most cable and fiber internet customers get to avoid. This could be a digital lifeline for rural regions of the country that don’t have access to those connections.
- Starry Internet: This fixed wireless provider uses millimeter-wave technology to offer a solution similar to 5G home internet. It features no contracts, and the price includes equipment, installation costs and unlimited data. The average cost per Mbps for Starry Internet is 17 cents in the first year before it jumps up to 22 cents.
- T-Mobile Home Internet: Similar to Starry, T-Mobile Home Internet features everything under one price, with no contracts required. All equipment, installation fees and taxes are included at $50 to $70 a month (or $40 to $50 per month for eligible mobile customers). The cost per Mbps is difficult to pin down since speeds will vary by address. T-Mobile claims most customers will average between 72 to 245Mbps download speeds. When CNET tested T-Mobile Home Internet, we hit a maximum of 132Mbps, and we’ve also received anecdotal evidence of customers hitting speeds of up to 300Mbps in some areas. Meanwhile, per T-Mobile, it’s possible some could potentially max out at 72Mbps. In other words, your mileage may vary — but if your address has a strong connection to a nearby cell tower, T-Mobile could be well worth a shot.
- Verizon 5G Home Internet: Verizon 5G Home Internet (its 5G fixed wireless internet service) is also squishy because its download speeds, ranging from 50 to 1,000Mbps, aren’t guaranteed. Assuming the average of 300Mbps, the average cost per Mbps would be 17 cents. Verizon 5G Home Internet is an all-in price that includes taxes, fees and equipment.
- WOW: WideOpenWest, which prefers to go by WOW, aims to wow its customers by requiring no contracts and very competitive starting rates. This cable internet provider offers five different plan options, with a highly competitive average cost of just over 7 cents per Mbps for its promo price and over 9 cents after the first year of service.
- Xfinity: Unfortunately, Xfinity requires customers to sign a contract to get its lowest price on internet service. Sometimes, and for some plans, it even calls for a two-year commitment. Xfinity does offer a prepaid internet option that requires no contract and gives you 30 days of internet service for $45. No deposit is required, and no fees, but you must make a one-time modem purchase of $35. The maximum download speed offered is 200Mbps, meaning this service has an average cost of 22 cents per Mbps, slightly lower than the 25 to 39 cents per Mbps other Xfinity customers will pay.
- Ziply Fiber: This company began offering service in 2020 after acquiring Frontier Communications networks in four Northwest states. It aims to simplify the purchasing process by skipping credit checks, data caps and term agreements. It features DSL and fiber plans, with the average cost per Mbps at 7 cents for the promo period and 12 cents after the first year.
Factors to consider when choosing a no-contract ISP
You’ll want to look at the cost per megabit per second of the provider’s plans to better understand whether you’re getting a good deal. While it’s fantastic to avoid having to sign a contract (and escape the looming threat of early termination fees), you still want to do your homework and make sure you’re not paying a premium for the freedom of not having a term agreement.
Also, look into the type of internet connection offered by the ISP. While some households — especially those in underserved or rural areas — may not have many options, the general rule is that satellite internet is better than DSL, cable internet is better than satellite and fiber internet trumps them all. 5G home internet, which has made significant strides, is also becoming a legitimate option for many nationwide.
How we evaluated the best no-contract providers
Internet service providers are numerous and regional. Unlike the latest smartphone, laptop, router or kitchen tool, it’s impractical to personally test every ISP in a given city. What’s our approach? We start by researching the pricing, availability and speed information, drawing on our own historical ISP data, the provider sites and mapping information from the Federal Communications Commission at FCC.gov.
It doesn’t end there: We go to the FCC’s website to check our data and ensure we consider every ISP that provides service in an area. We also input local addresses on provider websites to find specific options for residents. We look at sources, including the American Customer Satisfaction Index and J.D. Power, to evaluate how happy customers are with an ISP’s service. ISP plans and prices are subject to frequent changes; all information provided is accurate as of publication.
Once we have this localized information, we ask three main questions:
- Does the provider offer access to reasonably fast internet speeds?
- Do customers get decent value for what they’re paying?
- Are customers happy with their service?
While the answer to those questions is often layered and complex, the providers who come closest to “yes” on all three are the ones we recommend.
To explore our process in more depth, visit our how we test ISPs page.
What’s the bottom line on no-contract ISPs?
Sometimes, it feels like you must sign away your firstborn child — or at least the next two years of your life — to get internet service in your area. It’s easy to be swayed by slimmed-down introductory prices, but lurking behind that first-year cheer can be a hefty bill increase and unrelenting extra fees if you dare change your mind or (shudder!) have to move.
Thankfully, that’s changing. Competition is brewing among internet service providers as we become more dependent on broadband connections. That’s one reason why some ISPs have dropped their contract requirements. You may even find internet deals offering to buy you out of your contract to get you to switch. That’s good news for anyone looking to effectively explore their home internet options.
No-contract internet service FAQs
Can I get Wi-Fi at home without a contract?
We get this question quite often, as many assume they must pay for Wi-Fi separately from their internet service. That’s not the case, generally. You often get Wi-Fi when you sign up with an internet provider, as many will provide you with a gateway. That’s a combination of a modem (which connects your home to the internet) and a router (which takes that internet signal from the modem and broadcasts it wirelessly to the other devices in your home). Even if your ISP only provides the modem, you can rent a router or use your own. If you can get an internet connection at your address without signing a contract, you should have options to have Wi-Fi at your home without committing to a contract.
What is the best no-contract internet service provider?
It may sound like a cop-out, but the best no-contract internet provider for you is the one that’s serviceable at your address. As we’ve mentioned many times in our ISP reviews, all things being equal, if you can get fiber internet at your location, that’s the way to go. It’ll give you the best performance of all the internet connection types — you’ll get symmetrical download and upload speeds — and will often be the most affordable in terms of cost per megabit per second. Google Fiber, which includes all equipment costs and fees in your monthly rate, is the cheapest, averaging just over 4 cents per Mbps. Its availability pales compared to the fiber plans of AT&T, for example. If you live in one of the metro markets where it offers service, Google Fiber is an easy choice, but AT&T Fiber might be everyone else’s top option.
Can I get internet without paying upfront?
Unfortunately, none of the major internet providers offer buy-now-pay-later plans. However, you can turn to ISPs like Xfinity and Cox, which offer plans that are free of contract through prepaid internet or low-cost internet plans.
