Tesco Mobile review: Clubcard deals and discounts plus excellent support
Performance needs improvement, but Tesco is still a winner when it comes to customer support and satisfaction
Pros
- Award-winning customer service
- Free EU roaming (for now)
- Appealing deals and discounts
- Improving 5G coverage and speeds
Cons
- Lacklustre performance
- Poor results for video streaming
While some still sneer at the idea of a supermarket own-brand mobile network, it’s hard to argue with Tesco Mobile’s success. As a partnership between Tesco and Virgin Media O2, it’s now the UK’s largest virtual mobile network operator with more than 5.5 million customers. It has managed this, not just through its supermarket presence and competitive plans, but also by maintaining high levels of customer service and satisfaction. Last year it won the Customer Service Award in our annual Mobile Network Awards, having scored Highly Commendeds in the same category the two years previous.
This year’s awards see Tesco Mobile remain in the top spot for Customer Service, and also scoring high on value for money. Customer satisfaction hasn’t dropped, either: 84% of Tesco Mobile customers told our awards survey that they would be likely to recommend it to a friend or family member, with 44% saying that they would be very likely. There are some performance issues that hold Tesco Mobile back, but it’s still one of the strongest networks out there.
Tesco Mobile review: What do you get?
At one stage, Tesco Mobile offered a bewildering array of different Pay Monthly mobile and SIM only packages, but last year it reduced these to a more sensible and straightforward line-up. On the SIM only side, deals start at £7.50 for 2GB of data with unlimited calls and text, then climb to £18/mth for 100GB or Unlimited data for £25.
The best deals are on 24-month contracts, with 12-month contracts typically costing between 50p and £5 more month on month. Tesco Clubcard customers can save a little more, with special offers that reduce the monthly fee by a further pound or two. Tesco still doesn’t compete with the no-frills networks on low-cost pricing, but it’s usually slightly cheaper for any data allowance than the four big-name core networks.
| Package | Monthly charge (12 months) | Monthly charge (24 months) | Data | Texts | Minutes |
| 2GB data | £8 | £7.50 | 2GB data | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| 12GB data | £11 | £10 (Clubcard price: £9) | 10GB | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| 30GB | £15 | £13 | 30GB | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| 60GB data | £18 | £15 (Clubcard price: £13) | 60GB | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| 100GB data | £20 | £18 | 100GB | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Unlimited data | £30 | £25 | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| The monthly price shown will increase each April by the Consumer Price Index rate of inflation plus 3.9% | |||||
There are also Clubcard offers and discounts to be found on phones, including the Samsung Galaxy S24 5G and iPhone 15 at the time of writing. What’s more, you can build your own deals, altering the terms of the contract and the upfront payment to get the phone you want at a reasonable monthly price. iD Mobile, Three or Sky Mobile may still work out cheaper, but it’s always worth checking Tesco Mobile to see how its top offers work out.
Whether they’re buying a new smartphone on a contract or sticking with a SIM-only plan, Tesco Mobile customers seem unusually confident that they’re getting great value for money. In fact, more than 94% of customers told our survey that they were satisfied with the network’s value proposition, with over half (54%) very satisfied. Only Smarty, Voxi, Giffgaff and Lebara – all cheaper no-frills networks – achieved such good results, so Tesco is obviously giving users something to make any extra cost worth paying.
Tesco Mobile review: Customer service
That thing may be customer service. Eighty seven percent of Tesco Mobile customers told us they were satisfied with the network’s customer service – the highest score of any network in this year’s survey – with 47% of customers very satisfied. These results are mirrored in the last Ofcom survey, where Tesco had the joint-highest customer service score, and in Ofcom’s latest figures for customer complaints. Here, Tesco Mobile averaged one complaint per 100,000 customers; even lower than Sky Mobile, EE and Vodafone, with two complaints per 100,000 customers.
No surprises, then, that we awarded Tesco Mobile the Best Customer Service award for the second year running. When its customers are so happy with the service and support they’re receiving, so are we.
Tesco Mobile review: Coverage, reliability and speed
Tesco Mobile is a virtual mobile network, running over Virgin Media O2’s core network. The most recent speed tests from RootMetrics (for the first half of 2024) place Virgin Media O2 in fourth place of the big four networks on performance, with a UK-wide median download speed of 23.3Mbits/sec. That’s an improvement on the 15.5Mbits/sec it scored in 2023, but still under a third of the speed of leader EE, at 79.8Mbits/sec. On the plus side, its 5G median download speeds are improving, reaching 79.7Mbits/sec, as is the availability of its 5G services, at 55.9% in RootMetrics’ UK-wide tests.
Tesco Mobile’s customers seem reasonably happy with their speeds and reliability. In our survey, 85% told us that they always or often had a fast enough connection for web browsing, while 59% said the same about audio streaming and 49% said that speeds were always or often good enough for video streaming. However, that still leaves 5% saying that their connection was never sufficient enough for audio streaming, and 6% saying the same for video. With a further 13% of users saying they could rarely stream video, close to one in five of Tesco Mobile’s users struggle to watch video across the network – not a great result.
Tesco Mobile review: Roaming
Tesco Mobile has extended its Home from Home EU roaming feature until 2025, so you can still use your minutes, texts and data in Europe until next year, subject to a reasonable fair-usage policy with no restrictive data caps. In 2025, it will be a different story, with Tesco Mobile yet to confirm its plans on roaming for next year.
You need to be careful when it comes to roaming outside the EU; with call charges in the range of £1.29 to £1.49 per minute, and data charged at £5 per MB, costs can mount up very quickly. We wouldn’t rate Tesco Mobile as the ideal choice for frequent travellers.
Tesco Mobile review: Other services and spending caps
Tesco Mobile allows you to limit your monthly spend to your allowance and nothing more, or to add a safety buffer of between £2.50 and £50 outside your current plan. This provides some wriggle room if you need it.
Otherwise, there are some great benefits for Tesco Clubcard holders, including bonus Clubcard points, discounts on phones and plans and additional data and family perks. These allow you to put several numbers on a single account, and get extra data or minutes for each number, or money off the overall bill. There are no data-gifting or rollover features, but anything that helps keep costs down is a bonus.
Tesco Mobile review: Verdict
Tesco Mobile still triumphs when it comes to customer service and satisfaction, and winning the award for the second year running is a real achievement. While it can’t always compete with newer, no-frills networks on price, users still feel like they’re getting good value for money. However, we would like to see more improvements on performance and reliability, where Tesco Mobile seems to be lagging behind, so that users can enjoy the full range of streaming services while they’re mobile. At the moment, users can’t be guaranteed a decent connection almost anywhere they go. Hopefully, Virgin Media O2’s continuing 5G rollout will deliver this, and give Tesco Mobile’s customers the speed boost they deserve.
