@Daley It would probably be smart to look into alternatives now, but I'm going to wait a bit to see how this plays out.
Beware people bearing referral codes in the future.
And I'll save you the effort, and tell you the same thing I've told everyone here for nearly half a decade at this point. Just use RedPocket. Plans on all three networks, industry competitive monthly/annual/family plans for just about every budget. This said, it concerns me that they're corralling all their new annual plan customers onto AT&T, while still providing monthly plans with T-Mo and Verizon SIM options... and it's been a move that's happened within the past couple months.
That said...
That really only leaves RedPocket, Locus/H2O and Consumer Cellular as three of the last "major" MVNOs in this country if you don't count DISH's clown network and mostly still just an MVNO status, and all of these are either predominantly AT&T customer based, original AT&T MVNOs, or rapidly shifting to AT&T. Most of the remaining smaller MVNOs unimpacted by this buyout are now also, coincidentally AT&T based. And none of these brands were even near the size that Tracfone was. Verizon's already taken their move, taking out the 800lb MVNO gorilla, Tracfone Wireless, and all its sub-brands. Two years later, T-Mobile, in the process of buying Mint/Ultra, just took out one of the major T-Mo MVNE aggregators with Plum... which means a lot of the smaller T-Mo MVNOs are also under T-Mo's direct thumb now.
That just leaves AT&T's move at this point to finish killing off the MVNO market in this country. I most certainly could be wrong, but I suspect that DISH is never going to get off the ground as a mobile network, and instead of the FCC forcing DISH to divest their never planned to actually be used spectrum holdings to an
actual competent regional cellular network like USCellular to try and preserve a "four carrier" network, I suspect we're gonna see everyone hold out until the next Republican presidency and AT&T will swoop in and "save" DISH's failing mobile network by taking it off their hands along with leasing DISH's spectrum, and also buy all the various MVNO brands DISH has scooped up along with it. And somehow, all this will be blamed on Biden, because the network build-out happened under his administration, despite the fact that the T-Mo/Sprint merger and idiotic Boost to DISH divestiture with a pinky swear that a satellite company would build a fourth cellular network happened under Trump and his administration.
Remember, MVNO wholesale access isn't a legally mandated guarantee in this country, like they are over in Europe and other countries. Wholesale MVNO access was a gentleman's agreement between the Big Four cellular networks over two decades ago (and by gentleman's agreement, I mean "We pwomise to do dis, mistuh gubmint, please don't wegulate us any more!"), and now there are only three. It was only the competition and pricing of these MVNOs that even drove down cellular network pricing with the MNOs in the first place.
I'm not saying we're going to completely lose sub-$20/month calling plans or anything, because Lifeline legally still has to be a thing - though it's only for people below the poverty line and mostly cold comfort given it's one line per address in an era where multiple impoverished adults are having to live under the same roof to afford rent and everyone from employers to healthcare providers demand a cellphone number out of you... but we are most likely going to lose what remaining decent customer support was left, and we already know what the acceptable lowest price point is with all three major carriers with their longer-standing boutique pseudo-MVNO brands like Metro, Cricket, and Visible.
