Tello has a Valentine's Day promo for new lines running until 2/23.
Buy a Moto E4 or LG Tribute Dynasty for $49.95, including 1 month of unlimited talk/text & 1gb. You can change plans at the end of the month-- as always on Tello. If you stay on this plan, it's $14/mo.
These may be refurbished phones-- I didn't go far enough through the process to check. Tello says their phones are not locked to Tello, so either should be usable on any Sprint MVNO later if you should choose to do so.
This seems like a good price for either phone to me, considering they're not locked to Tello. (Just to clarify, they are NOT unlocked for use on GSM or Verizon, they could not be used on Sprint Postpaid, and they may not be eligible for Boost Mobile or Virgin Mobile activation.)
Thanks Kent. Yes they are refurbished as shown on the phone page. However I have had refurb phones from tello before and must say they always looked and seemed more like new. I do have a refurb tribute dynasty from them and it is a great phone for cellnuvo swiping as is the E4.
The dynasty and the E4 are about the same spec wise. I think the E4 has a slightly better screen (The lg is a bit blue) and is more like stock android. Camera is a little better on the e4. The lg has a few software advantages such as comfort view for night reading and is thinner. Both have removable batteries but the back of the lg is easier to remove and the sd slot and sim can be accessed without removing the battery unlike the moto. I'd lean to the moto personally but you can't go wrong with either.
It appears that they source their refurb stock from ex boost phones (often I see "boost" as the carrier name even though I am on tello) so they may well work on boost.
Thanks for the comparison, mmfacemm! Really useful info from someone who's familiar with both.
Although I've never bought a phone from Tello, my experience with buying from other Sprint MVNOs is that the phones frequently seem not to be 'refurbished', but just removed from provider-branded packaging & database identity.
(For example, a discontinued Boost or Virgin model might be repackaged in a white-box, and moved in the database to be a private label phone instead of Boost/Virgin.)