homes for service. T-Mobile is used where there aren’t enough hot spots being maintained by people or businesses.

Right now, they pay you in crypto (Helium MOBILE) to let them use your location data so they can see where there is good coverage so they can incentivize more people to set up hotspots and reduce the places they have to fall back to T-Mobile.

People are also rewarded with crypto for setting up and maintaining hotspots (basically radio and WiFi antennas). Right now, the rewards are high enough that you can earn enough crypto to pay for the $20 per month with the crypto you earned and not normal $.

It could change over time as their “people’s network” gets built out or as the value of the crypto coin changes.

Mostly I picked it just because it is a $20/mo phone plan and T-Mobile which it frequently relies on is good enough in my area. But the crypto rewards being worth something in the real world is interesting too.

More info: https://support.hellohelium.com/en/articles/7174144-discovery-mapping-faq