T-Mobile Completes Mint Mobile Deal, Promises New Perks for Mint Users

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T-Mobile's corporate palette now includes some green to go with its trademark magenta: The prepaid T-Mobile reseller Mint Mobile is officially property of the Bellevue, Wash., carrier. 

T-Mobile announced Wednesday that it had completed its acquisition of Ka'ena Corporation, the parent firm of Mint; Ultra Mobile, another reseller more focused on international service; and Plum, a wireless solutions provider. 

T-Mobile had estimated this transaction would cost $1.35 billion when it unveiled its plans for the purchase in March 2023, but Wednesday's release did not cite a final price. The FCC signed off on the transaction last week after T-Mobile committed to unlocking phones sold by Mint and Ultra Mobile after 60 days on the network.

Mint got more attention than other MVNOs (mobile virtual network operators) in part because actor Ryan Reynolds bought a share of the company and became its regular pitchman. (He stands to make about $300 million from the deal, according to early estimates.) But it's rates also seriously undercut what T-Mobile charged its own subscribers for access to the same 5G network.

Mint, however, requires customers to pay in advance to get its best deals. So its advertised $30/month rate for unlimited 5G is better thought of as $360 a year, with the added restriction that mobile-hotspot use on that plan is capped at 10GB a month.

PCMag readers found that proposition appealing enough to vote Mint the top wireless service in our 2022 Readers' Choice awards, then rank it third in 2023 and 2024 behind two other resellers, Consumer Cellular (the top pick in 2024) and Google Fi (first place in 2023).