T-Mobile Just Launched Its Own Very Cheap Phone

T-Mobile is ready to offer you more than just mobile service. Now the wireless carrier wants to provide your phone as well.

Credit: T-Mobile — (Image credit: T-Mobile)

Starting tomorrow (Aug. 10), T-Mobile will begin to sell its very own Android phone. The T-Mobile Revvl is a decent-looking smartphone with some very nice features that will cost you $5 a month to lease from the carrier. The Revvl costs $125 to buy outright.

MORE: T-Mobile Phone Plan Buying Guide

This phone, built by Alcatel on T-Mobile's behalf, isn’t for early adopters who want the newest Apple or Samsung hardware. And T-Mobile openly concedes that. “Not everyone walks into a T-Mobile store and wants the latest flagship,” T-Mobile Chief Operating Officer Mike Sievert said in a Wednesday blog post announcing the Revvl. “In a world where new phone prices go up year after year, many of our customers are looking for ways to keep up with the Joneses — in terms of features — without needing to keep up with the Kardashians — in terms of how much they spend.”

The specs of T-Mobile's Revvl certainly live up to that budget-minded focus. The phone offers a 5.5-inch HD screen with a 13-megapixel rear camera and a 5-MP shooter up front. A MediaTek MT6738 processor powers the phone, which includes 2GB of RAM and 32GB of storage. (A microSD card boosts sotrage to 128GB.) The 3,000 mAh battery seems solid for a budget phone, and the Revvl runs Android Nougat, the latest version of Google's OS (though Android O is set to debut shortly).

By comparison, the $129 Moto E4 costs roughly the same as the Revvl. It's also got a 5-MP seflie cam, but only an 8-MP rear shooter. Onboard storage is limited to 16GB on Motorola's budget model, and it's only got a 2,800 mAh battery. In other words, the Revvl's specs look pretty decent for a phone in this price range.

While you can buy the phone outright or pay it off in monthly installments, the Revvl is part of T-Mobile’s Jump! On Demand program, which lets you lease a phone for 18 months while upgrading to a new device multiple times a year. A handful of other budget phones are also part of the program as of tomorrow, though at $0 down and $5 a month, the Revvl is definitely the cheapest. Samsung’s Galaxy J3 Prime and LG’s Aristo are both $7 a month, while LG’s K20 Plus and ZTE’s ZMax Pro are $8 a month.

T-Mobile starts selling the Revvl tomorrow both at its website and in its retail stores.

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Caitlin is a Senior editor for Gizmodo. She has also worked on Tom's Guide, Macworld, PCWorld and the Las Vegas Review-Journal. When she's not testing out the latest devices, you can find her running around the streets of Los Angeles, putting in morning miles or searching for the best tacos.