Belong mobile plans

Belong is entirely owned by Telstra, but has plans at a lower cost than its parent company. It has the added distinction of promising carbon neutrality on all its mobile plans. With Belong, you get a choice of two plans: 10GB or 40GB, with no contracts involved.

2020 Finder Green Awards

Winner: Green Telco of the Year

Belong Mobile

Belong Mobile is Australia's first certified carbon-neutral telco. Any carbon emissions associated with operating its mobile and Internet services is offset by its investments in renewable energy and carbon-capture projects.

How we chose the winners

Compare Belong mobile plans here

Belong keeps it simple and straightforward with two mobile plans to choose from. Both plans fall under Belong's carbon-neutral guarantee, where it'll offset all related carbon emissions.

What do Belong plans come with?

Belong offers two SIM only mobile plans month to month, with no lock-in contracts.

• Regular. 10GB for $25 per month. Unlimited standard calls and text.
• Large. 40GB for $40 per month. Unlimited standard calls and text plus international calls to 30 countries.

Belong will not charge you for excess data use beyond your limit. Instead, it will shape your connection to 64kbps, though you can purchase a 2GB data top-up for $10 to get full-speed data again.

Options have been kept simple, with the Regular plan suited to those with average data use habits and the Large suited to those who enjoy streaming and downloading a lot while out and about.

While Belong is entirely owned by Telstra, its plans are completely different. We'll do a more direct comparison further down the page.

Belong mobile review: Is Belong as good as Telstra?

Whether Belong measures up to Telstra depends on what you want. Think of Belong as a cheaper and simpler version of Telstra that lacks all the added features and extras. Telstra will appeal to some people and Belong to others, but neither is objectively better.

Belong was started by Telstra back in 2013 as an Internet provider, but expanded into the mobile market as well a while back.

Not many mobile providers have set them apart in the same way as Belong by being carbon neutral, something Telstra itself is still working to achieve.

Here are the main features of Belong mobile plans:

No-contract plans

A month-to-month plan gives you a degree of flexibility, meaning you can cancel your plan whenever you want to go on a trip or change provider. You won't ever be charged a termination fee or be pressured to stay with Belong when you want to switch.

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Carbon-neutral company

Carbon neutrality doesn't mean Belong produces zero emissions – it means it's paying for carbon offsets. These offsets come in the form of investment into renewable energy and carbon-capture projects to remove equivalent amounts of carbon from the atmosphere.

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Unlimited data bank

Any unused data you have left at the end of the month is rolled over into a data bank for the next payment cycle, with no limit. If your payments get way overdue, you'll lose banked data. You keep this bank even when switching between Belong mobile plans.

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No data excess fees

When you exceed your monthly data allowance, your download speed will be cut to almost nothing, 64kbps, but you won't be charged for further use. A note: 64kbps is largely unusable for anything other than checking your emails, so don't get too excited!

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Belong mobile app

Belong maintains a basic mobile app, available on both the Google Play Store and Apple App Store. You can check your balance, see how much data you've used and do basic account management.

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In addition to the main ones above, Belong has a couple of other extras on its plans:

• Data gifting. If you have unused data left in a month, you can transfer it in 1GB units to other Belong mobile customers.
• International inclusions. By default, Belong's $40 plan includes unlimited calls and text to 30 countries. You can add this feature to its $25 plan for an additional $5 per month.
• Data pack. When you run out of your data allowance, your data speed gets cut way down. Top up with 2GB for $10 to keep downloading at full speed.

Data banking is an uncommon feature for SIM only postpaid plans (usually prepaid plans will feature a data bank), so it could make Belong worthwhile. Still, if you're ending up with heaps of data left over each month, you might be better off simply downgrading to a mobile plan with less monthly data – unless you want to gift it to your friends on Belong, of course.

Feature	Does Belong have it?
Excess usage warning
Entertainment extras
Data-free media streaming
Rollover data
Data sharing
International calls/texts
International roaming
Rewards program
Student/pensioner discounts

How does Belong compare to other providers?

We took Belong's best-value plan and lined it up against similar ones from Telstra (its parent company) and Mate (another MVNO SIM only provider).

As you can see, Belong is highly comparable to the Mate plan, offering about the same in the way of extra features. It's cheaper than Telstra and omits the entertainment extras and other Telstra-specific features, but comes out at a better dollar per data value.

Belong's "no excess data charge" feature is also not as good as Telstra's. Telstra will reduce your speed to about 1.5Mbps past your full speed data, while Belong drops to a snail's pace of just 64kbps. 1.5Mbps is semi-usable, but 64kbps isn't even really close to 4% of Telstra's reduced speed.

How are Belong mobile plans carbon neutral?

When Belong claims to be carbon neutral, it isn't claiming to produce zero carbon emissions. Rather, it offsets 100% of its carbon emissions by investing in various schemes and projects.

These projects involve wind farms, solar parks and others that meet criteria set by Climate Active. Climate Active is a carbon-neutral initiative that is backed by the Australian government. You can find out more on Belong's website.

Does Belong have international roaming?

No. You won't be able to use your Belong mobile plan overseas under any circumstances.

You can make calls and send texts to international destinations from Australia. The $40 plan includes unlimited standard calls and texts to 30 countries by default. You can add the same to the $25 plan for an extra $5 per month.

Where can I buy a Belong SIM?

You can purchase a Belong SIM and mobile plan from this page, using the comparison table above. Simply buy the plan you want and a SIM will be delivered to you.

Otherwise, you can purchase a Belong SIM from the Belong Mobile website or in person at stores including Coles, Officeworks and JB HiFi.

Frequently asked questions about Belong

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