Feature

Apple Announce 'Affordable' Plans

AT&T and Apple have announced three available price plans for the iPhone ahead of its launch on Friday, each one bundled with free minutes, texts, and data.
 
The individual plans are priced at $59.99 for 450 minutes, $79.99 for 900 minutes and $99.99 for 1,350 minutes. All plans involve a one-time activation fee of $36.

Subscribers buying a 4gb model and signing up to the lowest plan will be looking at nearly a $2000 investment over the course of the two years. Subscribers with the higher-end model and top plan are looking at over $3000.

That's a lot of money for kudos.

All three plans include unlimited data, Visual Voicemail, 200 SMS text messages, roll-over minutes and unlimited mobile-to-mobile calling. With everything else already included, iPhone customers only have to choose the plan that's right for them based on the amount of voice minutes they plan to use each month.

"We want to make choosing a service plan simple and easy, so every plan includes unlimited data with direct Internet access, along with Visual Voicemail and a host of other goodies," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "We think these three plans give customers the flexibility to experience all of iPhone's revolutionary features at affordable and competitive prices."

All iPhone plans include Visual Voicemail which allows consumers to see a listing of their voicemails, decide which messages to listen to, then go directly to those messages without listening to previous messages. Just like email, Visual Voicemail on iPhone enables users to immediately and randomly access the messages that interest them most.

The iPhone goes on sale at 6:00 p.m. (local time) on Friday, June 29 and will be sold in the US through Apple's retail and online stores and AT&T retail stores. The handset will be available in a 4GB model for $499 (US) and an 8GB model for $599 (US).