Accessing the Mobile Internet may cost less than you think.

The cost of browsing the Mobile Internet depends on your mobile carrier and your price plan.

On your mobile carriers portal (On Deck) you often don't pay for viewing the pages. If you're not sure about what you will be paying for, ask your mobile carrier.

Outside your carrier's portal (Off Deck) your carrier may charge for time spent browsing the Mobile Internet, or by the amount of Megabytes of data that you use. For example, if your carrier charges $1 per MB of data, it may cost just a few cents to read three pages of a news story. Text based items use less data than images or video, so will cost you less to view.

Check with your mobile carrier to find out their specific charges.

Yes, you can. If you can't get enough of the Mobile Internet and are using it regularly, it's a good idea to sign up to a mobile data pack to save money. Some mobile companies call this a web pack, data plan or data service.

For example, if you have signed up to a Mobile Internet pack that includes 5MB of data per month you can use up to 5MB of data without incurring any extra charges for data usage.

5 Megabytes of data per month will allow you to read a LOT of Mobile Internet text pages. Pages which include images and video will use up your monthly data allowance more quickly.

Some carriers allow you to view how much data you have used. Check out your mobile carrier portal for details.

• Go to Mobile Internet sites (rather than regular websites) these are usually designed to keep the MB sizes down, and not chew through your data allowance. Sites that start with m. or ends with .mobi are always mobile sites.
• Browse pages which don't contain a lot of images or moving images, as these images chew through a lot more data than simple text. You may also like to check if your mobile has the ability to turn images off whilst viewing the Mobile Internet - this will dramatically reduce the data charges.
• If the Mobile Internet site that you are viewing takes quite a while to load up, it is likely that it contains quite a lot of data (e.g. from images). Sites which load quickly often contain less data, and may therefore cost you less to browse.
• Keep an eye on your MB usage each month by accessing your details on the Mobile Internet, your carrier's website, your carrier's call centre or on your bill each month. Review how much you are spending on the Mobile Internet, and discuss your usage patterns with your mobile carrier to see if there is a better plan or data pack to suit you.
• Check out the Top Mobile Internet sites listed on this website for some great sites to browse.

• Some Mobile Internet sites may require you to pay a fee to view the pages, but most are free.
• The fee could be in the form of a daily fee, a monthly subscription or a fee to purchase certain content.
• Any fees that may be charged have to be clearly explained before you accept the charge.
• Make sure you read the terms and conditions so you understand exactly what you are paying for and know how to stop paying.
• There are two main ways that you can pay fees:
  • On your mobile carrier portal you will usually be able to accept payments by clicking a few buttons and the charge will appear on your mobile phone bill.
  • If you are looking at mobile sites outside the mobile carrier portal, you will usually for things using Premium SMS.