Sunday, February 9, 2014

Karma Wifi Hotspot review: Feel good about sharing your connection

High per-gigabyte pricing and weak coverage hurt an otherwise interesting model for mobile data.

Whether it's to get our Wifi-only tablets online, save battery on our phones or simply diversify to have connections from multiple carriers, many turn to a mobile hotspot for their data needs. Most hotspots follow a very similar billing model as a phone — pay every month for a certain amount of data, and at the start of the next month you have the same amount of data refreshed.

The Karma Wifi Hotspot is different, and for a specific set of people it may just be a great go-to device if you just need some extra data here and there. At the simplest level, Karma is a pay-as-you-go mobile hotspot. You purchase the device itself for $99 and refill data onto it at the rate of $14 per 1GB (or less if you buy in bulk). The data doesn't expire at the end of the month, though, it actually never expires.

But that isn't Karma's only trick. Your hotspot is open for any other Karma user to take advantage of — and if someone else logs into your hotspot, you'll both be rewarded with free data that gets added right onto your data balance. Read along and learn how Karma is hoping to be your next choice for pay-as-you-go data.