Which Tracfone Card?

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Here's a quick rundown on buying a Tracfone card for adding airtime. You can buy them at any one of a bazillion retail locations in the USA.

Once you buy the card online, it's pretty simple to add your minutes to your Tracfone during the process.

Current Cards

Here's a current Tracfone card list.

Airtime Cards

Tracfone Airtime Cards are good for 30 days, 90 days or one year.

You can click here to refill your Tracfone Prepaid Wireless Airtime, but before you do, make sure you check out the latest promo codes to get a few extra minutes. You should do the same before activating a Tracfone card you buy at stores.

9.99 30 minute card

This $9.99 30-minute card with a 45-day service period seems to have been discontinued as it's no longer available online and out of stock in stores.

19.99 60 minute

This $19.99 60-minute card has a 90-day service period.

29.99 120-minute

The $29.99 120-minute card also has a 90-day service period.

39.99 200-minute

The $39.99 200-minute card also has a 90-day service period.

79.99 450-minute

The $79.99 450-minute card also has a 90-day service period.

99.99 400-minute

The 400-minute card comes with a one-year service period, which is why it costs $99.99. You're essentially paying for the extra service period. There's usually a promo code to bump it up to 600 minutes.

119.99 800-minute double minutes

The 800-minute one-year card has a service period of one year, but also includes double minutes for life on all future airtime purchases as long as your service doesn't expire.

159.99 1000-minute Card

199.99 1500-minute Card

Double and Triple Minutes for Life

If you don't have a triple or double minutes phone, you can buy a separate double minutes for life card for $19.99, but it's not worth it unless you don't want the hassle of switching phones and transferring all the numbers in your phonebook. That's because there are several Tracfones available that come with the double minutes for life feature already included, and some of these phones (like the Motorola W376) cost the same or less than the price of this card. The triple minutes phones cost slightly more but you get the savings back in the end.

The prices of these cards have stayed about the same, but the number of minutes and the service period had increased over time. For example, a while back, the 19.99 card only bought 40 minutes of airtime with a 60 day service period. First the number of minutes increased to 60 and then the service period increased to 90 days. (Some stores still carry these old cards. Avoid them!) After a while they stopped changing them and introduced phones that doubled or tripled the number of minutes on the cards instead.

When you buy online from Tracfone, during the ordering process you will be asked if you want to further add to your minutes or to the service period as shown in this screenshot:

You can get a (very) small discount on a Tracfone card at places like Walmart and Target.

Depending on whether you know how long you will keep your prepaid phone service and how many minutes you tend to use or just in terms of convenience, it may be better to purchase a Tracfone card with a one-year service period.

Tracfone also offers some good deals on their website on reconditioned phones packaged with airtime cards.

SBI!