Smart Signature vs Globe ThePLAN Plus Postpaid Plans : Data Allocation and Bundled Services Comparison

Since Smart Communications officially launched their all-new Signature Postpaid Plans last June 14, 2019, many of you have been messaging me questions on how these new offerings from the MVP company compare against Globe Telecom's ThePLAN Plus bundles.

If you're one of those who have asked for my thoughts about these postpaid plans over the past few days, I made this post for you.

Before we go to the side by side comparison of what's included in Smart Signature and Globe ThePLAN Plus Plans, though, allow me to make this disclosure: I am currently a Smart Digital Ambassador and Technology Blogger Partner.

However, I also want to remind you that this is my tenth year as a Pinoy tech blogger and content creator -- and I know I wouldn't have lasted this long without your trust in my opinions and recommendations. Having said that, you can be assured that I will do my best to practice fairness in comparing these bundles.

Alright! Let's do this! Here's a table that I made which shows the data allocation and bundled services that subscribers can get from each plan as of today, July 1, 2019.

TechPinas Postpaid Plan Inclusions Comparison Table
	Smart Signature	Globe ThePLAN Plus
599	NA	1. Data - 1.5GB 2. Calls - Unli to Globe/TM 3. SMS - Unli All-Net 4. Others - 1GB Facebook Access
799	NA	1. Data - 6GB 2. Calls - Unli to Globe/TM 3. SMS - Unli All-Net 4. Others - Spotify Premium (3 months)
999	Plan S 1. Data - 10GB 2. Calls - Unli On-Net and 100 mins AnyNet 3. SMS - Unli AnyNet	1. Data - 8GB 2. Calls - Unli to Globe/TM 3. SMS - Unli All-Net 4. Others - iflixVIP (6 months  subscription, no data included), DisneyLife (6 months subscription, no data), Amazon Prime Video (6 months subscription, no data), and Spotify Premium (3 months)
1299	NA	1. Data - 12GB 2. Calls - Unli to Globe/TM 3. SMS - Unli All-Net 4. Others - iflixVIP (6 months  subscription, no data included), DisneyLife (6 months subscription, no data), Amazon Prime Video (6 months subscription, no data), and Spotify Premium (3 months)
1499	Plan M 1. Data - 20GB 2. Calls - Unli On-Net and 200 mins AnyNet 3. SMS - Unli AnyNet	1. Data - 16GB 2. Calls - Unli to Globe/TM 3. SMS - Unli All-Net 4. Others - iflixVIP (6 months  subscription, no data included), DisneyLife (6 months subscription, no data), Amazon Prime Video (6 months subscription, no data), and Spotify Premium (3 months)
1799	NA	1. Data - 19GB 2. Calls - Unli to Globe/TM 3. SMS - Unli All-Net 4. Others - iflixVIP (6 months  subscription, no data included), DisneyLife (6 months subscription, no data), Amazon Prime Video (6 months subscription, no data), and Spotify Premium (3 months)
1999	Plan L 1. Data - 30GB 2. Calls - Unli On-Net and 300 mins AnyNet 3. SMS - Unli AnyNet	1. Data - 21GB 2. Calls - Unli to Globe/TM 3. SMS - Unli All-Net 4. Others - iflixVIP (6 months  subscription, no data included), DisneyLife (6 months subscription, no data), Amazon Prime Video (6 months subscription, no data), and Spotify Premium (3 months)
2499	NA	1. Data - 26GB 2. Calls - Unli to Globe/TM 3. SMS - Unli All-Net 4. Others - iflixVIP (6 months  subscription, no data included), DisneyLife (6 months subscription, no data), Amazon Prime Video (6 months subscription, no data), and Spotify Premium (3 months)
2999	Plan XL 1. Data - 60GB 2. Calls - Unli On-Net and 300 mins AnyNet 3. SMS - Unli AnyNet	NA

I think the data are pretty straight-forward but let's go through them one by one.

Data Allocation - For plans where there's point for comparison, Smart Postpaid tends to offer a notably bigger open access data allocation. You can argue that Globe Postpaid comes with 3 months subscription and data for Spotify Premium -- but not everyone is keen on using that service and the bigger data from Smart can easily cover that too for Signature subscribers who are into it.

SMS - They're totally even in this department. It's nice to see both companies offering unlimited text messaging to all networks in their postpaid plans. Whether we accept it or not, SMS is still a relevant mobile service in the Philippines, be it for work or play.

Calls - Both Smart and Globe offer unlimited on-net (same network + subsidiary network) calls but only Smart gives allocation (generous, in fact) for calls to other networks. I'll give this one to Smart.

Options - It's practically 8 versus 4 with Globe having more ThePLAN Plus bundles to choose from. Globe Telecom's plans also start from as low as 599, which can be quite enticing for those who are a bit tight on budget. Amazingly, Smart has the most expensive Plan in this comparison at 2999, which comes with a whopping 60GB of monthly data allocation, which is great for power users. Anyway, when it comes to number of plans to choose from, I'll give it to Globe. But if you prefer getting a streamlined and concise list when making a choice, then you might find Smart Signature Plans more appealing.

So there you go! I hope this comparison made it easier for you to decide which postpaid plan to sign up for. If it did, I hope you can share this post to your friends in social media.

To wrap up, allow me to share an interesting report made by OpenSignal in August 2018 based on mobile connectivity data they gathered from the Philippines around middle of last year. According to the research firm, Globe has wider 4G coverage but Smart offers faster 4G speeds in our country. Globe’s availability score was 67.79% versus Smart’s 64%. Open Signal noted that Smart's average 4G download speed is 13.02 Mbps, which is almost double Globe's average 4G download speed of 7.34 Mbps.