So, how is the speed after the 1 GB is used up? We tried to burst the 1GB limit by doing lots of speedtests around town area. At one moment we were able to get high speeds of 50 Mbps. After a few tests, speedtest terminated abruptly without any indication that we have burst the 1GB limit. The next few tests returns a speed of around 256 kbps. The worst thing of all is that the uplink speed is almost non existent at 0 Kbps.
Comparing this to Zero1 which keeps it at 1 Mbps, MyRepublic throttling it to 256 Kbps is abit extreme. YouTube videos can stream fine at 240p but 360p is with lots of buffering. Facebook is fine but upload of pictures will take longer than before.
WhatsApp voice calls isn’t affected as the amount of bandwidth required is very low.
Tethering using 256kbps
If you are thinking of using the mobile phone as a hotspot to your PC or notebook, the 256 kbps will crawl and I bet you do not wish to go back to ASCII days using a dial up 9600bps modem. It is too slow to even complete a simple wordpress post. Speedtest.net failed with Socket errors.
Roaming & App
Although the data speed is slow, MyRepublic has a pretty robust billing system. Within a few hours of usage, I received a password protected PDF file for my bill till 19/6/2018. The bill is S$8 and that includes the GST of 7%.
Data Roaming in overseas countries is definitely a welcomed move by MVNOs. Circles.Life has a comprehensive app and roaming service too which is slightly more expensive. Both ZeroMobile and Zero1 do not have any roaming available. Zero1 has a better unlimited plan (after 3GB) at 1mbps but it has almost zero support – phone number to call, tracking app, roaming service.
So, if you are looking for a cheap unlimited data plan, my personal opinion is to stick with Zero1. If you need to make tons of calls, the 1000 minutes will be more suitable. The MyRepublic UNO plan will serve well as a secondary line for yourself or your parents or children without worrying of bursting the data limit. It is also important to note the 4G coverage as it might not be as good as those running on M1 and Singtel.