American Airlines is greatly expanding the free Wi-Fi that T-Mobile customers have access to, which is pretty exciting. I first wrote about this last week, but American has now officially announced this, with an exact timeline for when it will be fully rolled out.
In this post:
Free T-Mobile Wi-Fi coming to American’s Viasat planes
Historically American has offered free Wi-Fi to T-Mobile customers on Gogo (now Intelsat) equipped aircraft. The catch is that over the past several years, American has aggressively been retrofitting planes with Viasat Wi-Fi, in order to be able to offer fast and reliable internet. As a result, the number of aircraft offering free Wi-Fi for T-Mobile customers has greatly decreased.
There’s an exciting update on that front. American is in the process of rolling out free Wi-Fi for T-Mobile customers on Viasat aircraft, meaning that all narrow body aircraft will shortly offer this. Most regional jets already have Intelsat Wi-Fi, meaning they already offer Wi-Fi for T-Mobile customers.
This expanded T-Mobile Wi-Fi should be rolled out on all Viasat planes by July. Unfortunately don’t expect any free Wi-Fi on American’s wide body aircraft, which feature Panasonic Wi-Fi, even if you’re flying a 777 or 787 domestically.
T-Mobile has long been a sponsor of inflight Wi-Fi through its “Coverage Beyond” program. With this, the company offers free Wi-Fi on select flights with Alaska, American, and United (T-Mobile also sponsors free Wi-Fi on Delta, but that’s available to all SkyMiles members).
How the free T-Mobile Wi-Fi on American works
If you’re a T-Mobile customer, you can take advantage of the free Wi-Fi by logging onto the Wi-Fi portal at aainflight.com. Once there, you should see the option to connect via T-Mobile for free (assuming this has been activated on the aircraft you’re flying on).
You’ll just have to enter your phone number (the phone number of an eligible T-Mobile customer), and then you’ll be able to connect.
Note that the amount of free Wi-Fi you receive depends on your plan:
- Magenta MAX customers receive unlimited free Wi-Fi
- Magenta customers can choose four flights a year where they get unlimited free Wi-Fi, and receive one hour of free Wi-Fi on all other flights
It’s important to clarify that the free Wi-Fi will only work on your mobile device, and not on a laptop. So unfortunately those of us who want to use our laptops will still need to buy a Wi-Fi flight pass or monthly membership (unless there’s some sort of a tethering or hotspot trick I’m missing).
Bottom line
T-Mobile customers will have access to a lot more free Wi-Fi on American Airlines. Free Wi-Fi will be available on all narrow body aircraft by July, including those that are equipped with Viasat Wi-Fi. This is in the process of being rolled out, so start looking for it, but don’t be surprised if a Viasat plane doesn’t have it quite yet. This is an exciting development that a lot of T-Mobile customers will no doubt appreciate.
What do you make of T-Mobile free Wi-Fi expanding to more American flights?
I fly east coast to west coast and back every week. I’m seeing more flights with out this T-mobile option.
I flew from SJO to DFW. Still no T-Mobile access.
I flew from DFW to LaGuardia in September 2023 - no t-Mobile wifi. Then from DFW to LAX then to Kona no wifi. Back from OGG to DFW in October 2023 no wifi
Flew AA PHX-PHL on 6/14/23 a321neo, no Tmo wifi.
The best way I've found to share the connection is a travel router. You connect the router to the Wi-Fi and then use your phone to do the T-Mobile stuff which authenticates the router. You can then use the router's Wi-Fi network to connect multiple devices.
Am writing this from an AA A321 with Viasat from ATL to MIA right now and getting free WiFi from the T-Mobile program.
As someone who uses T-Mobile as their carrier I am really happy about this decision. I was on a flight just yesterday and having only ever used the Gogo wifi on American the Viasat wifi proved to be very fast and it could easily support streaming. Overall I am really excited that American offers this product
The Magenta plans have been discontinued so you might want to update the details. “Go5G Plus and Magenta MAX customers get unlimited in-flight connection. Go5G and Magenta customers get in-flight connection on four full flights a year with 1-hour sessions thereafter.”
Sooo, its free but not really? Looks like limitations.
Magenta MAX customers receive unlimited free Wi-Fi
Magenta customers can choose four flights a year where they get unlimited free Wi-Fi, and receive one hour of free Wi-Fi on all other flights
Not to fast, only work on flight of 4hrs or more
I don't think so. I flew EWR ORD last week and used one of my four passes.
Does t-mobile customers get free wifi for the entire flight on AA? Delta it is just for a limited time.
This has been free on Delta for many years now
Meanwhile Delta offering free wifi…
But delta is terrible in every other way
Is this only on domestic planes, what about international wide body Viasat planes
It works on International. United has the same benefit. I used one of my full flight credits from EWR-DXB a few months ago.
You don't even need to be a tmobile customer, you just need to know someone who is or google tmobile phone numbers. There is no verification the number you enter is actually yours. As long as you enter a tmobile number your phone will connect.
Wouldn't AA ping your handset in the background to verify T-Mobile service and eligibility? It would surprise me if they didn't.
Great, I can discontinue my monthly AA WiFi prescription now!
There is one (that I've seen) practical benefit on GoGo that Viasat/Panasonic don't offer: SMS/MMS functionality. When I'm on a GoGo-equipped plane, my phone functions normally (except theoretically for calls, but I don't call anyone on the ground so nbd there). On a Viasat-equipped plane, there's no SMS so I can't text people.
I had it on my plane 2 days ago- was surprised to see it.
Is “hotspot” a verb now?
Any noun can be verbed, now! ;)
What is a "Magenta" customer? What if you just have pre-paid on T-Mobile? You also need a phone that supports "T-Mobile Wi-Fi Calling". In other words, for many people, this is totally useless.
Considering postpaid makes up like 90%+ of business this is in fact very useful for the vast majority of people. Prepaid is not that common nor is free wifi an included benefit
Magenta is a level of T-Mobile service for which you pay. Magenta MAX is their top level. Details on T-Mobile. I
If you have Pre-Paid T-mobile plan and a phone that doesn't support Wi-Fi calling, I'm going out on a limb and saying you aren't flying that much to really matter.
Lol Ben you definitely do not have to pay for a laptop. You can hot spot from your phone to the laptop very easily
Most phones don't hotspot from one wifi to another. They usually can't simultaneously be both client and access point. You can use USB tethering, I guess.
Most phones do now. But you have to disable airplane mode. Works perfectly, I do it every time I fly and the speed degradation isn't too bad
That’s just not true…Some phones like iPhone do support hotspot over Bluetooth, and you don’t have to disable airplane mode. But for wifi-wifi to work your phone has to have 2 radios which is not the case.
But if you are a bit savvy in IT networking you can use your laptop easily without any hotspots…
@Alex Manero - Works perfectly for me as well.
Works everything for me also.
Shhhh!
This has been available on Android phones for a few years now. This is done by accessing the Wi-Fi network using the 2.4GHz radio then creating the hotspot using the 5GHz radio (or vice versa). However, some carrier-locked models may have this functionality disabled by the carrier. Also, iPhones do not support this feature.