EE Unlimited Data Plans: Download Speeds, Personal Hotspot & Fair Usage

By Ken Lo December 12th, 2023 31 comments

EE offers unlimited data from £23 per month (£10 per month if you’re an EE home broadband customer). Find out how their unlimited data plans compare.

In the UK, EE now offers a range of unlimited data plans, starting from £23 per month (or just £10 per month if you’re an EE home broadband customer). There are a range of download speeds available (up to 10Mbps, up to 100Mbps and their fastest available speeds), along with varying benefits such as Inclusive Extras and data gifting on an EE family account.

In this article, we’ll look at EE’s unlimited data plans, including the different plans available and the features on each one. We’ll also look at how the download speeds compare, along with the added features and the fair usage policy on each plan.

• 1 EE Unlimited Data Plans
• 2 Download Speeds
• 3 Inclusive Extras
• 4 Data Gifting
• 5 Fair Use Limit
• 6 Keeping Your Phone Number
• 7 Frequently Asked Questions
• 8 More Information

EE Unlimited Data Plans

In the UK, EE now offers a choice of four different types of unlimited data plan.

• The cheapest unlimited data plans are in their No Frills range. Here, you’ll get a maximum download speed of 10Mbps. There are no Inclusive Extras and the data gifting feature isn’t available. However, you can still use as much data as you want and it’s fast enough for most day-to-day activities (including the streaming of HD-quality video). Plans start from £10 per month if you’re an EE home broadband customer (otherwise, it’s £27 per month).
• For faster download speeds and the ability to gift some leftover data within your EE family account, you can upgrade to the Essential unlimited data plan. This will give you download speeds of up to 100Mbps, allowing you to benefit from the faster speeds available on 5G. You can also gift some of your leftover data within your EE family account. EE’s Essential unlimited data plans start from £13 per month if you’re an EE home broadband customer (otherwise, it starts from £23 per month).
• For the fastest available speeds and an Inclusive Extra such as Netflix or Apple Music, you can upgrade to an All Rounder unlimited data plan. Prices start from £19 per month if you’re an EE home broadband customer (otherwise, it starts from £28 per month). When you take some of the Inclusive Extras into account, this can sometimes work out to be the best value. For instance, the TNT Sports extra is worth £20 per month. You’ll get 3 Inclusive Extras on the Full Works plan.

The following table shows a side-by-side comparison of EE’s unlimited data plans:

EE Broadband Discount

If you’re not currently an EE home broadband customer, it might be beneficial to sign up for this first.

At present, you can get EE’s home broadband service from £29.99 per month. Once you have that, you’ll unlock their unlimited data SIM card discount, with plans available from only £10 per month.

The following table shows EE’s latest fibre broadband deals:

Download Speeds

You’ll get access to EE’s 4G & 5G network on all of their unlimited data plans. However, the maximum download speed available might be restricted, depending on the type of plan you choose:

• EE’s No Frills unlimited data plan is restricted to a maximum download speed of 10Mbps. This is roughly equivalent to the speeds you can get on a decent 3G connection or on a basic 4G connection. This is sometimes referred to as ‘basic speeds’ by EE. It’s enough for the vast majority of day-to-day usage (you only need about 5Mbps to stream HD-quality video). The main downside is that you won’t be able to stream in Ultra HD quality, and larger downloads may take a long time.
• EE’s Essentials unlimited data plan has a maximum download speed of 100Mbps. This is the speed you’re typically able to receive on a good 5G network connection.
• EE’s All Rounder and Full Works plans come with their fastest available download speeds. According to a recent RootMetrics analysis (H1 2023), the average download speed on EE’s 5G network is 145Mbps. This is faster than the maximum download speed that you’re able to get on an Essentials plan. Having said that, it’s unlikely this will make much of a practical difference, unless you’re downloading very large files over a 5G connection.

Inclusive Extras

If you choose EE’s All Rounder unlimited data plan, you’ll get one Inclusive Extra for the length of your plan. For instance, this could be an inclusive subscription to Netflix, Apple Music or TNT Sports on discovery+.

Customers with a Full Works plan can choose three Inclusive Extras with their plan.

The following options are available for your Inclusive Extra on EE:

• Apple Music (worth £10.99 per month): With Apple Music, you’ll have access to more than 100 million songs through on-demand streaming.
• Apple TV+ (worth £6.99 per month): If you choose Apple TV+, you’ll be able to watch Apple Original shows and movies through the Apple TV service.
• Apple Arcade (worth £4.99 per month): Available to customers with an iPhone, this gives you access to more than 200 games on your mobile phone, without any adverts or in-app purchases.
• TNT Sports on discovery+ (worth £20 per month): This inclusive extra gives you access to all four TNT Sports channels, as well as the discovery+ Ultimate streaming service. You’ll be able to watch live action from the Premier League, the UEFA Champions League, and more.
• Microsoft 365 Personal (worth £5.99 per month): This gives you access to all of the Microsoft Office applications on your PC and mobile, including Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Outlook. You’ll also get 1TB of cloud storage on OneDrive.
• Roam Abroad Pass (worth £25 per month): With the Roam Abroad pass, you’ll be able to use your plan allowances at no extra cost in the EU, the USA, Canada, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand (up to 50GB per month).
• Xbox Game Pass Ultimate (worth £12.99 per month): The Xbox Game Pass Ultimate gives you access to more than 100 games on your PC, Xbox console, and in the cloud. Play games like Starfield, Forza Motorsport and Halo Infinite.
• Netflix (worth £7.99 per month): This gives you an inclusive Netflix Basic subscription, allowing you to watch unlimited shows and movies from Netflix on one device at a time.

If you choose a No Frills or Essentials plan from EE, you won’t get any Inclusive Extras with it. However, you’ll still be able to get 6 months of Apple Music free with your plan.

Data Gifting

If you have multiple lines on the same EE account, you’ll unlock Family account benefits. As part of this, customers with an unlimited data plan (excluding No Frills plans) can ‘gift’ up to 100GB of unused data to another line within the same family account (you can gift up to 120GB data if you have a 5G handset plan with unlimited data).

There are several things to note when taking advantage of this feature:

• The data you use will reduce your shareable data allowance first. For instance, if you’ve already used 40GB of data on your unlimited data plan, you’ll only have 60GB of data leftover to share. For this reason, it’s normally best to gift your data as soon as your allowances refresh at the start of the month. This will allow you to get the maximum benefit from the Data Gifting feature.
• You’ll need to manually gift your data each month. There’s no way to set up automated sharing of your data.
• It isn’t possible to gift data from or to a No Frills plan. The Data Gifting feature is only available on Essentials, All Rounder and Full Works plans.
• It’s only possible to gift data within your own family account. For instance, you won’t be able to share unused data with a friend. The Data Gifting feature only works within an EE family account, where all of the lines are paid for by one person.

Fair Use Limit

All of EE’s unlimited data plans have a fair use limit of 600GB per month in the UK.

If you go above this 600GB limit, they may use ‘traffic management controls’ to deprioritise your traffic. Alternatively, they might ask you to move to a business plan instead. This is stated within the terms and conditions on the EE website:

We will consider usage above 600GB/month to be non-personal use and have the right to apply traffic management controls to deprioritise your mobile traffic during busy periods or to move you to a business plan.

In addition, the use of tethering and personal hotspot is limited to a maximum of 12 devices at the same time.

Keeping Your Phone Number

If you’re leaving another mobile network to join EE on an unlimited data plan, it’s a straightforward process to keep your current phone number.

Start by ordering your new unlimited data plan from EE’s website. Once you’ve done that, you can request a PAC Code from your old network. This can be obtained through your mobile network’s website or app, or by texting PAC to 65075.

When your new unlimited data SIM card arrives from EE, head over to this online form. Here, you’ll be able to submit the PAC Code from your old network. Once you’ve done this, your phone number transfer will normally be scheduled for the next working day.

For a step-by-step guide on how to move your phone number to EE, please select your current mobile network from the dropdown menu below:

Frequently Asked Questions

On EE, unlimited data plans are currently available from £23 per month (or £10 per month if you’re an EE home broadband customer).

This basic ‘No Frills’ unlimited data plan offers download speeds of up to 10Mbps. For faster download speeds, Inclusive Extras, or the ability to gift data to your family, you’ll need to upgrade to a more expensive plan.

Yes. You can use tethering and personal hotspot on EE’s unlimited data plan. However, as per EE’s terms and conditions, this is limited to a maximum of 12 devices on a regular basis. The use of tethering or personal hotspot on more than 12 devices would be considered by EE to be “non-personal use”.

Yes. There’s a fair usage limit of 600GB per month on all of EE’s unlimited data plans. Customers exceeding this 600GB fair use limit may see their download speeds being reduced, or may be moved onto a business plan instead.

• The No Frills plan has a maximum download speed of 10Mbps.
• The Essentials plan has a maximum download speed of 100Mbps.
• The All Rounder & Full Works plans have uncapped speeds. According to RootMetrics, the average download speed on EE’s 5G network is 145Mbps. However, it can exceed this in some cases.

More Information

For more information about unlimited data on EE, please see the official EE website. You may also find it useful to read our in-depth guide to unlimited data plans in the UK.