‘Time to go’: Three has just introduced speed limits on its plans – and customers aren’t happy

Three is introducing speed limits on phone, SIM only and mobile broadband plans for new and upgrading customers.
The cap is 100 Mbps in most cases, with Pay As You Go having a lower cap.
Existing customers are not affected and contract customers will be able to pay extra to remove the cap.

Three appears to have taken a step backwards, as where previously you could get uncapped 5G on all of its plans at no extra cost, the network has now implemented speed limits.

Specifically, new pay monthly mobile plans (i.e. SIM only or new handset contracts) will have a speed limit of 100 Mbps, just like mobile broadband plans. It’s still possible to get uncapped speeds, but you’ll either need to choose a new ‘Lite+’ plan or pay £4 more per month.

On Pay As You Go, the cap is more like 25 Mbps – or 50 Mbps if you have an auto-renewing pack.

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This is a considerable reduction compared to what the network is actually capable of. In a January 2026 report, for example, Opensignal found that the average 5G download speed on Three was 187 Mbps. But now, to get that, you’ll have to pay £4 more per month on the company’s new Pay Monthly plans, and there’s no way to uncapped your speeds on Pay As You Go.

The only good news here is that these changes don’t affect existing contracted customers, and if you’re currently on an auto-renewing Pay As You Go plan, you’ll also retain uncapped speeds while staying with the same pack.

But of course, when you come to upgrade your contract, or if you ever change your Pay As You Go pack, then you will have these ceilings in place.

The merger could be to blame

Three’s merger with Vodafone could be a factor in these speed limits (Image credit: VodafoneThree)

Naturally, the internet isn’t too happy about this change, with reactions on Reddit including “time to go,” “my to-do list has moved further from Three,” and “the merge should never have been allowed to happen.” This last quote refers to Three’s merger with Vodafone, which could be the cause of these new speed caps, especially as Vodafone itself restricts the speeds of some of its plans.

Interestingly, these changes do not yet appear to apply to MVNOs (mobile virtual network operators) that operate on Three’s network, with iD Mobile confirming that there are currently no speed limits on its network.

So, as well as being generally cheaper than Three, its MVNOs may now have a clear advantage – although how long this gain lasts remains to be seen, with iD Mobile also noting that “the industry trend is clearly moving towards tiered speeds”.

Still, for now, if you’re on Three and need to upgrade – or are considering switching to Three – you might want to check out one of its MVNOs instead.

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