New dog, new tricks: Buddy Telco is the latest NBN provider reshaping how you connect to the internet

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It could be your new best bud with the cheapest NBN 1000 plan on the market

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The price of NBN plans has been rising recently, which means many people are wisely switching providers to secure a cheaper plan. If you’re in the market for a  new cheap NBN plan, Aussie Broadband just unveiled its own budget carrier, the appropriately named ‘Buddy Telco’. 

Launched in July, Buddy uses Aussie Broadband’s well-regarded network infrastructure, but strips certain provider features back so it can offer plans at cheaper prices.

One of the main differences between bigger telcos and budget telcos such as Buddy Telco is that they don’t sell hardware such as modems, so you’ll need to provide your own. If you choose to sign-up and migrate from another NBN provider, there's a good chance the modem supplied by that provider will work with Buddy Telco's service. You may need to check whether you're required to send your modem back to your current provider, or if there are any charges you'll be required to pay in order to hold onto it. 

Another distinction is that Buddy Telco doesn’t provide telephone customer support, but if you need help, there is an AI-powered online live chat you can submit your queries to. In the instance that the chatbot can’t solve your problem, however, you will eventually be connected to a human. 

Buddy currently has four NBN plans on offer: NBN 25, 50, 100 and 1000. All are fairly competitively priced, but its NBN 1000 plan has actually taken the crown for the cheapest NBN 1000 plan around. 

Here’s a quick rundown on each plan: 

Standard NBN (NBN 25)| $65 per month

Standard NBN (NBN 25) | $65 per month
Buddy’s NBN 25 plan comes with unlimited data and typical evening speeds of 24Mbps. This plan is a few dollars cheaper than the average NBN 25 price of $69.92 (as of August 2024), and $10 cheaper than Aussie Broadband’s own NBN 25 plan, which costs $75 per month. While you can find slightly cheaper NBN 25 plans (which start at about $60p/m), it’s arguably a good price given the Aussie Broadband infrastructure.

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Value NBN (NBN 50)| $75 per month

Value NBN (NBN 50) | $75 per month
NBN 50 is still the most popular NBN speed tier in Australia, with its 50Mbps speeds ideal for households with up four users, allowing everyone to connect and stream with relative ease. Buddy Telco’s NBN 50 plan advertises typical evening speeds of 49Mbps and like all of Buddy’s plans, you’ll have to BYO modem. The average price of an NBN 50 plan in Australia (as of August 2024) is $82.89, so this one’s $7.89 cheaper than the average and also $14 cheaper than Aussie Broadband’s NBN 50 plan. 

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Speedy NBN (NBN 100)| $75 per month for the first 6 months, then $85 per month

Speedy NBN (NBN 100) | $75 per month for the first 6 months, then $85 per month
Buddy’s NBN 100 plan is currently discounted to $75 per month for the first six months, then rises to $85 per month. That ongoing price is still $5.85 cheaper than the current average price of NBN 100 in Australia, which is $90.85, and $10 cheaper than Aussie Broadband’s NBN 100 plan. The ongoing price of $85 is decent value, but the introductory offer means that for your first year you’ll only pay an average of $80p/m. 

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Zoomy NBN (NBN 1000)| $89 per month for the first 3 months, then $99 per month

Zoomy NBN (NBN 1000) | $89 per month for the first 3 months, then $99 per month
Buddy’s NBN 1000 plan is currently the cheapest of its type in Australia. While most households don’t require anywhere close to the speeds offered by this tier, if you do need ’Ultrafast’ internet, this costs $99 per month ongoing, making it $5.95 cheaper than the next cheapest NBN 1000 plan (TPG’s $104.99 plan) and $30 cheaper than Aussie Broadband’s own service. In terms of speed, Buddy Telco advertises typical evening speeds of 600Mbps which is quite a way behind the fastest advertised NBN 1000 speeds on the market, however early reports from new Buddy customers suggest that real world speeds are significantly faster, with one Whirlpool user saying he is getting the same speeds as he was with Aussie Broadband’s NBN 1000 – 930Mbps. 

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Compare Aussie Broadband and Buddy NBN plans:

Amelia Hetherington
Amelia Hetherington
Ecommerce Editor

Amelia is an Ecommerce Editor at Getprice who specialises in hunting down great bargains and useful discount codes across a wide variety of products and retailers, curating gift guides for all occasions, and doing the maths to calculate the top-value mobile and internet plans for a variety of needs. Her goal is to help make finding the best online discounts as easy as possible. She loves writing about major deals and sales events to help you get the most bang for you buck at sales time.