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The products or services listed have been independently tested by our journalists. We earn a commission from the affiliate links in this article. Read more >
Tesco Mobile (from) £5.00
Buy nowTesco Mobile is a virtual network, which means it doesn’t install its own masts and other equipment, but piggybacks off the established O2 network.
That’s by no means a bad thing, because the virtual networks often offer better deals and customer service than their big owners, and that’s certainly the case with Tesco Mobile.
In our survey, Telegraph readers rated Tesco Mobile as the joint best network for value, speed and reliability, and the outright winner of the best customer service award, making Tesco Mobile the best mobile network in this year’s survey.
There are cheaper providers out there, but Tesco Mobile has SIM-only deals starting from £5 a month, which is fine if you only use a mobile phone for emergencies.
At the other end of the scale, it has unlimited data deals from £25 per month (as long as you sign up for the free Clubcard supermarket rewards scheme), and a huge range of SIM-only tariffs in between, as well as all manner of deals if you want to include a phone in your contract. It has deals on all the best smartphones, including iPhones and the latest Samsung Galaxy handsets.
We surveyed 1,022 Telegraph readers across the UK* to find out who provided their mobile network and what they thought about the service. Readers provided their verdicts for the three master brands (EE, O2 and VodafoneThree), as well as virtual networks (MVNOs): Tesco Mobile, Lebara, Sky Mobile, BT Mobile and Giffgaff.
We excluded any provider used by fewer than 20 per cent of our readers. In addition, we categorised providers with an average rating of three stars or lower as “below average”.
As well as speed, reliability, value for money and ease of contact, we asked our readers how helpful their providers were once they got through to them, as well as their experiences using data roaming while abroad.
Score: 5/5
Tesco Mobile is right up there with some of the best-value deals you’ll find from any mobile network. If you’re a data fiend, you might want to check out joint value award winner, Lebara, but Tesco has a wide spread of deals, particularly on SIM-only.
Note that Tesco offers its best prices to customers who are part of its Clubcard loyalty scheme, so if you’re ordering online, you might want to sign up for the free Clubcard first. You can also use Clubcard vouchers gained from supermarket shopping to pay your phone bills. More details on this in the FAQs below.
Pay particular attention to those Clubcard deals, because they can mean a one-year contract is cheaper per month than a two-year deal, the latter of which might also include an annual price rise.
Score: 4.5/5
The data speed performance of the Tesco Mobile network is right up there with the best, according to the Telegraph readers we surveyed, with an 89 per cent satisfaction score for speed. That score was only matched by Giffgaff, which also piggybacks on the O2 network.
Tesco Mobile includes 5G and 4G coverage in all of its plans. 5G coverage for O2 (Tesco Mobile’s parent network) is some way behind that of EE, with the regulator Ofcom claiming O2’s 5G network has outdoor coverage to 70-76 per cent of UK premises. EE, by comparison, reaches 86-89 per cent.
Score: 5/5
The Tesco Mobile customers we surveyed were happy with the reliability of the network. It achieved an 89 per cent satisfaction score for the reliability of voice and text, and 81 per cent for data coverage. Overall network reliability, covering issues such as outages, was up at 93 per cent.
Score: 5/5
Tesco Mobile is head and shoulders above its rivals when it comes to customer service. A healthy 94 per cent of customers were satisfied with the ease of contact and 93 per cent were impressed with the quality of support. Those scores are at least 12 percentage points better than the next closest rival.
Tesco Mobile does, of course, have the advantage of in-house staff in many of its supermarkets, potentially making it easier to reach than other virtual network rivals that may rely on phone/online support alone.
Score: 4/5
All of Tesco’s SIM-only contract deals include free EU roaming, although you should check the terms carefully on phone contract and PAYG deals. Of the Telegraph customers we surveyed, 80 per cent were satisfied with the roaming value on offer.
(Note: this is just a sample of the SIM-only deals available from Tesco Mobile)
Yes, if:
No, if:
The Research Method
*Online survey of adult Telegraph readers conducted on The Telegraph Contributors Panel, 27th November - 11th December 2025, conducted by Strat7 Researchbods. Survey sample: 1,022 total respondents. Respondents consisted of:
Providers with fewer than 40 respondents were excluded from the individual analysis as their sample sizes were not significant.
Respondents rated their mobile network providers across 13 key attributes using a 10-point scale. These individual ratings were then aggregated to produce an overall performance score based on our proprietary benchmark.
The key attributes evaluated were:
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