HACKER Q&A
📣 gnicholas

Do phone calls count toward your data?


I just got the email from my cell phone provider:

> Beginning January 2024, we're enhancing our network services, and as a result, C-Band and Ultra Wideband data (indicated by 5G+ on your device) will start counting towards your cellular data usage threshold.

Is this their way of saying that my calls that are routed over 5G will count against my data usage? If so, it is a very roundabout way of saying it!

  👤 gnicholas Accepted Answer ✓
If 5G calls count against my cap, I'd just as soon set my phone to LTE only, since I don't really need 5G speeds anyway. Seems like just a ploy to be able to nickel and dime customers, and start charging for phone calls that carriers used to tout as free/unlimited.
👤 wmf
That's a bizarre sentence to send to customers, as if they have any understanding of radio bands. I see nothing about calls here (VoNR calls should not be limited to particular bands) and phone calls use virtually no bandwidth anyway.
👤 akerl_
It sounds like they previously were giving you 5G data usage for free. There's nothing about calling in the quote you provided, it specifically references 5G data.