Got Karma?
One of the ways I’ve saved money since leaving my full-time staff job to go freelance is by getting rid of my cell phone bill. For the last 5 years, I’ve only used a pre-paid card for any calls and texts. And consistently this costs me just a bit over $100 a year. Yes, a whole year. I can never share this enough. Many of you just have a contract or expensive plan because it’s what you’ve always had, but more and more new pay-as-you-go plans are available now. And if you don’t make many calls and don’t text much, you could really save a lot of money.
But, one thing my simple pre-paid plan leaves me without is data. So, the only way I can get online on my mobile is to use WiFi, which is most cases is easy to come by—in my home, in hotel rooms, in many cafes and even aboard this Amtrak train from which I’m writing this post.
Last year, I was able to try my own hotspot, but it was generally pretty slow and after a year, it expired.
Enter Karma.
The Karma Hotspot, is a tiny and cute portable wifi hotspot that connects wirelessly to my phone to give me data. And just like my cell phone “plan”, I love that Karma is “pay as you go.” So you can add money for more GB of data when you run out. But what makes this little device really special is it’s an open network and anyone can join by simply signing up. And when a random person sees my hotspot and signs on, they get 100 free MB and so do I! So anytime someone logs on, I get more minutes to use. They get free Internet and I get more free internet. Good Karma all around!
Many times when I’m using it, I’ll get an email that basically says “Maria has just signed on to your Karma! You now have a bonus 100MB.”
It’s great. Sometimes I just turn it on so people can use it…and I can get more free time!
Here’s how it breaks down:
- Data costs $14/GB
- Data never expires
- No Contract
- No Monthly Plan
- runs on 4G LTE and fallback to CDMA (3G) on Sprint
- 802.11b/g/n 2.4Ghz wireless networking
- Supports up to 8 simultaneous connections
- Maximum speed 54Mbps
- Rechargeable battery with 220 hours standby time and 5 hours internet usage
Their brand new device, the “Karma GO” is on pre-order right now and is faster with a larger coverage area. If you click through here you get $10 off!
Disclosure: I was given a Karma device to review. As always all writing and opinions are my own.
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Lauren Meshkin @BonVoyageLauren
October 30, 2014 at 2:14 pmThis would definitely come in handy when I travel abroad and have to rely on wifi to use my phone. I love how it’s pay as you go too and you can share it to get free data. Thanks for sharing! I’m bookmarking this.
Happy travels 🙂
Lisa
November 5, 2014 at 3:00 pmThanks Lauren! Keep in mind, right now it just works inside the US. Karma may expand but until then, there are other devices that you can use abroad like MiFi.
Jools Stone
October 31, 2014 at 7:32 amPretty good deal. I could’ve done with this when on some of those wi-fi-less Amtrak trains, bookmarked for the next trip! 🙂
Lisa
November 5, 2014 at 3:00 pmGood point Jools! I will say I had Wifi on Amtrak between Chicago and Milwaukee and it was grand! Of course it was “broken” on the ride home. Booo!
David
October 31, 2014 at 3:56 pmAn excellent idea to promote use of the service with regards to the free 100 MB of data. As for the affordability of the wifi router, so long as you aren’t a power user that’s data hungry, this is a great solution for internet wherever you happen to be!
Mary @ Green Global Travel
November 2, 2014 at 5:17 pmLooks like a great deal, and that’s great you both benefit with new users! Thanks for sharing!
Stephanie - The Travel Chica
November 8, 2014 at 11:48 amCool concept. Are there concerns about security if anyone can sign on?
Lisa
December 3, 2014 at 10:59 amHi Stephanie! I can’t say for sure about security, but I think they explain it on their site since no one is actually sharing your computer, just the wifi and each user has a separate sign-on and account.
Bobby
December 4, 2014 at 4:27 amI ordered one (for $89 CYBER WEEK DEAL) to use with my wifi only tablet – so I don’t burn up my phone’s battery all the time. Also good to have for those areas my phone carrier doesn’t have good coverage.
Lisa
January 28, 2015 at 3:14 pmCool Bobby! Did you get the new one yet? I’m curious to hear what you think of it?
Joe
February 9, 2015 at 1:09 amSadly the release date for the new LTE-model got pushed back to April 2015 (just pre-ordered mine today).
Dan Fraley
February 19, 2015 at 8:29 pmThanks for the info-Is Karma still in business?
Lisa
February 20, 2015 at 12:13 pmYes Dan, I’m still using my device. You can check them out on their site.
BradleyUC
June 8, 2016 at 1:44 pmThe karma spot complements a low-cost pay-as-you-go plan like Lycamobile (go online and request a SIM, but do not select any plan at all). I believe it’s 2 cents/minute, 3 cents/SMS, and no data at all. I have used this combo where I need T-Mobile’s voice network. I believe Lycamobile also works globally (Lycamobile is a UK company).
Another alternative is to use an almost-free service like RingPlus. RingPlus is an odd pay-as-you-go provider on the Sprint network (US only, zero roaming on affiliate CDMA carriers like USCellular… bascially, it’s the same footprint as Karma). Their popular service is free voice, SMS and data, with some big limitations.
RingPlus offers “promo” deals roughly 50% of the time. You can sign-up for alerts, and wait a few weeks for a good promo (2000 minutes/2000 SMS/2GB data on full-speed LTE is decent). Their service appears to be funded by customers who buy extras, but our kids have been using the carrier for about 6 months with only one charge-inducing “oops.” (hint: SMS is free but not MMS).
Some characteristics of RingPlus include that when calling outbound, you don’t hear the familiar “ringing phone” sound, but rather you hear pre-recorded advertisements. Additionally, I’ve noticed a high number of outbound call failures. My advice is to install Google Dialer or Talkatone, and use those apps for all your talking and texting.