What is Lyca Mobile: Plans, coverage and what you need to know about this low-cost phone carrier

Tom's Guide

5 days ago

In a wireless phone market filled with low-cost carriers, Lyca Mobile can sail under the radar of would-be customers — an odd development given that the company has been providing wireless service in the U.S. for more than a decade.
Should you take another look at Lyca Mobile for your wireless coverage? Given the company's competitive rates — particularly when you pay for a year's worth of service in advance — it may be a good idea if you're looking to lower your monthly cell phone bill.
With Lyca operating in multiple countries, here's what you need to know about Lyca Mobile and its wireless service in the U.S.
As an MVNO, or mobile virtual network operator, Lyca Mobile doesn't own and operate its own towers. Instead, it turns to another carrier's network to provide cellular coverage for talk, text and data, including 5G service.
In Lyca's case, that service comes from T-Mobile, even after the companies settled a long-standing dispute over their arrangement in October 2024. At the time, multiple reports claimed Lyca Mobile would migrate its service to AT&T's network, but when I checked with the carrier in summer 2025, T-Mobile remains the network provider.
That's good news for Lyca customers, as mobile-testing firm Ookla named T-Mobile as the fastest network in the U.S. for the first two months of 2025. Both RootMetrics and Opensignal have T-Mobile as the fastest carrier, too, and it's widely accepted that T-Mobile has the most extensive 5G reach right now.
In my experience testing service from other MVNOs, including T-Mobile's Metro by T-Mobile and Verizon's Visible, I've found that performance through an MVNO tends to pretty closely match the service you'd get directly from the parent carrier, though you can see speeds slowed down when there's a lot of traffic on the network. I haven't personally tested Lyca's performance, but I imagine the experience would be similar to other MVNOs.
Some MVNOs sell phones, but that's not Lyca Mobile's modus operandi. Instead, you bring your own device to the carrier, making it an ideal option if you've got one of the best unlocked phones.
You can check ahead of time to see if your phone is compatible with Lyca's mobile service, using the company's IMEI checker. There are instructions there for checking both iPhone and Android devices.
Lyca Mobile has a whole host of plans. Looking at the carrier's plan page, which is covered with various promotional offers, data bonus and options for longer term coverage than just month-to-month service, might make you kinda dizzy.
To cut through some of that clutter, I've broken down Lyca's monthly plans into the chart below. Each plan features unlimited talk and text along with a specified data amount, and escalating perks as you opt for higher-priced plans.
Monthly prepaid plans
Price per month
Perks
500MB
$15
International talk/text to 100 countries
3GB
$19
International talk/text to 100 countries
5GB
$23
International talk/text to 100 countries
25GB
$29
International talk/text to 100 countries; 10GB hotspot data
Unlimited Plus
$49
40GB of high-speed data; International talk/text to 100 countries; 10GB hotspot data
Unlimited Pro
$59
60GB of high speed data; International talk/text to 100 countries; 25GB hotspot data
A basic plan at Lyca starts at $15/month and includes a mere 500MB of data. For just $4 extra each month, you can expand that data pool to 3GB, with 5GB ($23/month) and 25GB ($29/month) also available. Go over your monthly cap and your speeds are throttled.
In addition, Lyca has two unlimited data plan options. Unlimited Plus ($49/month) lets you enjoy up to 40GB of high-speed data while the Unlimited Pro offering ($59) ups that data cap to 60GB. It's not uncommon for even unlimited data plans to cap the amount of high-speed data you can consume each billing cycle, so Lyca is just following a widespread practice among carriers.
Each plans include talk and text to other countries, with plans from the 25GB option on adding hotspot data as a perk. Unlimited Pro offers the biggest allotment of hotspot data at 25GB.
Like Mint Mobile, Lyca lowers your monthly rate when you pay for your service in advance, with Lyca offering different pricing tiers at 3, 6 and 12 months. Take that $23/month 5GB option. You can save $48 total by paying $21 for 3 months of service in advance. The savings go up to $54 total by paying $84 for 6 months of service and $120 when you buy a full year for $156.
There are 10GB and 12GB plans available in 3-, 6- and 12-month payments, too. Lyca also has a variety of buy-one-month-get-one-month offers as of this writing.
Lyca Mobile: 25GB of data for $29/monthOur pick for Lyca Mobile's best plan gives you a lot of data — 25GB — for a little less than $30. You also get 10GB of hotspot data with this plan as well as international talk and text to 100 countries. It's just one of many plans at Lyca, where options ranges from a mere 500MB to unlimited data plans. The carrier also offers discounts if you pay for plans in 3-, 6- and 12-month increments with special offers tacking bonus data on to plans, as well.
Lyca Mobile allows you to add additional lines of data to just one of its plans, the one with 25GB of data. Even better, the cost of each new line drops as you add extra lines.
While your first line of Lyca's 25GB plan starts at $29, the cost of the second line drops to $14. A third line costs another $10, while the fourth line is available for $7. Add it all up, and a family of four would pay a total of $60/month with each member getting their own 25GB data pool.
Among the best family cell phone plans, Total Wireless has been our pick, with four lines of unlimited data costing a total of $110, which is $50 more than what Lyca would charge. Total's plan comes with more data and slightly better perks — in addition to more hotspot data, Total's plan also provides six months of Disney Plus and discounts on phone upgrades if you stick with the carrier for a year. But Lyca's family plan definitely competes on value.
When you pay for your cell phone plans in 6- or 12-month chunks, Lyca becomes a more attractive option.
While we're comparing Lyca Mobile to what other low-cost carriers charge, let's look at prices for just one line of data. For our best cheap cell phone plans, we look at offerings under $40/month, and Lyca's 25GB plan for $29 would be your best option there.
You can get unlimited data from Mint Mobile for roughly the same amount — Mint charges $30/month — but to get that rate, you'd need to pay for a full year of service in advance. Boost and Visible both have unlimited data plans for $25/month without requiring big upfront payments, and Visible's best unlimited data plan costs $35/month — less than the $49/month you'd pay for unlimited data at Lyca.
It's when you pay for your cell phone plans in 6- or 12-month chunks that Lyca becomes a more attractive option than the competition. As noted, Lyca charges $156 total for 12 months of its 5GB plan — that works out to $13/month. Mint's 5GB plan requires a $180 upfront payment for a full year of coverage, so you're essentially saving $2 per month by opting for Lyca.
Lyca Mobile currently has a rating of 3.9 out of 5 on TrustPilot based on 8,600-plus customers reviews. At Amazon, where you can buy SIM cards from Lyca, customers give the carrier a 3.8 out of 5 rating, based on 200-plus reviews.
Customer reviews tend to praise the wide variety of options and the ease of setting up an account. The most consistent complaints revolve around customer service, particularly the speed of responses.
Lyca Mobile seems geared toward a very specific type of wireless customer — one who's willing to move their current phone to a new carrier and doesn't mind paying in advance if it means the best rate. Lyca isn't the overall cheapest option around for phone coverage and some low-cost carriers offer better perks, but if you're looking for a specific type of plan, you may find a lot of value in what Lyca Mobile has to offer.