Why you should enable Verizon's 'unlimited premium network access' on your account (Updated)

Update: July 17, 2024 (12:20 PM ET): Verizon confirms with us that the “unlimited premium network access” setting is indeed solely about HD video streaming, and does not affect access to your plan’s unlimited data.

Original article: July 16, 2024 (5:12 PM ET): Calling mobile carrier plans “confusing” would be the sort of understatement that makes “understatement” itself an understatement. Subscribers all too often have an incomplete picture of plan offerings, struggle to directly compare plans across networks, and find themselves bombarded by confusing promises — like “unlimited” plans that are very much constrained by various hard limits. Verizon users poking around their account settings may have stumbled across a toggle for “unlimited premium network access.” That sounds all sorts of appealing, but what exactly does this control, and why should you make a point to have it enabled?

We caught wind of some Verizon subscribers wondering about this option over on Reddit, where user papahstax got the discussion going yesterday, curious what flipping the switch would do to their account and the wireless service they receive.

Verizon plans currently consist of three main tiers: Unlimited Ultimate, Unlimited Plus, and Unlimited Welcome. Checking out the important plan information that Verizon shares for all three, you’ll notice that the first two explain that they include the ability to stream HD video when connected over 5G UWB — full 1080p for Ultimate, and 720p for Plus. But the key detail here is that this option “must be turned on by customer in My Verizon online, the My Verizon App or by calling customer service,” and that appears to be the premium-access toggle we’re looking at today.

Why wouldn’t something nice like this just be enabled by default? Well, that’s a very good question (especially how we’re supposed to be talking about “unlimited” accounts here), and while the cynic in us could easily see this as little more than “saves Verizon money,” we can also envision scenarios where forcing this option when the network can’t handle it results in a poor user experience. Couldn’t there be a more graceful way to automatically adapt, while also giving eligible subscribers the highest quality video by default? That sounds plenty reasonable to us, but go ask Verizon.

Speaking of that, we’ve reached out to the carrier for further clarification on this toggle, and to see if it’s tied to any other account options worth being aware of. We’ll update our coverage with any response we get.