T-Mobile customers appear to be changing their tune after the carrier implemented several notable changes to its pricing, plans, and discounts in recent months.
For example, in April, T-Mobile refreshed its fiber internet plan lineup with lower prices but cut voice line discounts and its 5-year price guarantee from these offerings. T-Mobile also raised prices on all of its 5G home internet plans by $5 in June and added new speed limits.
That same month, the carrier phased out several legacy wireless plans, moving some customers to replacement options with higher monthly costs.
By July, T-Mobile scrapped its KickBack discount, which rewarded customers with $10 in monthly savings per line when their data consumption remained under 2GB.
T-Mobile faces rising customer losses
Amid these changes, T-Mobile revealed in its latest earnings report that its postpaid account churn (the percentage of customers who cut their service) reached 1.09% in the third quarter of 2026, up from 0.97% a year ago.
The carrier also added 274,000 new postpaid accounts during the quarter, fewer than the 396,000 it added in the same period in 2025. In addition, T-Mobile’s postpaid ARPA (average revenue per account) hit $155.73, up from $149.44 the previous year.
While the company did not disclose specific churn rates for postpaid wireless and postpaid broadband accounts, T-Mobile Chief Financial Officer Peter Osvaldik said on an Oct. 28 earnings call that its churn levels during the quarter were as expected.
“The makeup of postpaid accounts and 5G broadband and fiber-only accounts churning predictably as they always do at a higher level structurally than postpaid phone churn itself,” said Osvaldik.
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He confirmed that the company did see an increase in postpaid phone churn due to its decision back in June to discontinue several legacy wireless plans, which he said will have a “couple-quarter impact.”
“The Q4 (fourth quarter of 2026) impact will be much more muted,” he said. “But we do anticipate a little bit of impact in Q4.”
Osvaldik said that T-Mobile expects to see higher churn in general in the fourth quarter of this year than in the third quarter.
“Seasonally for everybody, Q4 tends to be a higher churn quarter than Q3 because of the holiday season,” he said. “There’s a lot of excitement around it. I’d expect that seasonality to continue. So churn implicitly would go up, account churn as well.”
He said that the growing popularity of broadband-only accounts and T-Mobile’s recent acquisition of UScellular have contributed to, and will continue to contribute to, increased churn for the remainder of the year.
“There’s more 5G broadband and fiber-only accounts,” said Osvaldik. “However, we had UScellular as well come on board.”
“And so you’re still going to see the dynamics of, yes, accounts include blended accounts, but they also include more and more 5G broadband-only or fiber-only accounts, which offer obviously a great opportunity in the future for cross-sell and deepening the relationship, but just as a result of, well, broadband churn is higher than postpaid phone, it’s a pure mathematical exercise,” he said.
T-Mobile navigates rising competition as rivals expand bundled offerings
T-Mobile’s recent increase in customer losses comes amid intensifying competition in the wireless and broadband markets.
Verizon and AT&T have been leaning more into offering customers bundled wireless and broadband deals to attract price-conscious customers.
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For instance, AT&T introduced its OneConnect plan in March, bundling wireless service and 1-gig fiber home internet for a monthly fee of $90. Verizon followed a similar approach in June when it launched its Verizon One plan, a $ 70-per-month offering that combines wireless and home internet service.
Cable operators have also been successfully gaining wireless customers after launching bundled offers.
Comcast began offering a free mobile line with its internet plans in 2025, and it revealed in its most recent earnings report that it added 368,000 new Xfinity wireless customers in the U.S. in the third quarter.
In its second-quarter 2026 earnings report, Spectrum said it attracted 406,000 new wireless customers. The increased demand follows the launch of its $1,000 savings guarantee earlier this year, which promises new and existing Spectrum internet customers who switch two or more mobile lines from Verizon, AT&T, or T-Mobile $1,000 in savings in their first year.
Many U.S. consumers have been opting for bundled mobile and internet deals to save money amid economic pressures.
According to a 2025 survey by Optimum, 80% of Americans consider bundling broadband and wireless services more cost-effective than paying for each service separately. Also, about 1 in 4 said they are likely to sign up for a bundled plan in 2026.
In an analysis in August, Steve Vachon, a senior analyst at TBR’s telecom practice, said the telecom industry is “entering a new phase” as convergence strategies take “center stage.”
“The next phase of U.S. telecom growth will increasingly depend on how effectively operators combine wireless and broadband assets to deepen customer relationships and capture new revenue opportunities,” wrote Vachon.
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