ATT has issued a press release today that indicates you’ll be able to keep your old grandfathered-in unlimited data plan on your new iPhone 5 even if you upgrade using its subsidized pricing, as pointed out by Matt Buchanan on Twitter.
ATT’s Ralph de la Vega had this to say about the iPhone 5 and the upgrade process, emphasis ours:
We offer customers the flexibility to keep the iPhone data plans they already have or choose any of our individual or new Mobile Share plans. We’re proud that more customers choose ATT for iPhone than any other U.S. carrier and look forward to making iPhone 5 the newest addition to our lineup.
So it looks like grandfathered plans are all good on ATT, so that should please those of you who have yet to change your plans from way back in the day. Those plans, of course, are only unlimited to a point as ATT will eventually throttle your speeds until the next billing cycle and they’re 3G only, meaning that these people might not get LTE coverage.
Verizon has taken a different tack, allowing you to keep old unlimited data plans, but refusing to subsidize their phones. That means that you’ll have to pay the full rate for your iPhone 5, which starts at $500 and up, if you want to keep your old plan.