Staff rating

3.8

Plans starting at $65.00

Download speeds up to 1000 Mbps

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Staff rating

3.6

Customer rating

0.0

(0)

Plans starting at $14.99

Download speeds up to 1000 Mbps

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Staff rating

4.1

Customer rating

3.8

(70)

Plans starting at $15.00

Download speeds up to 940 Mbps

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Staff rating

3.8

Strong value and performance from a smaller brand

Overall, we like Clearwave Fiber. It’s a speedy fiber provider with decent pricing and good customer service. Our main complaint is that it’s just not as competitive on the pricing as it could be. In general, though, we think people will be happy with Clearwave Fiber.

What we like

Symmetrical speeds
Unlimited data
No contracts

What we dislike

Price hikes after 12 months
Relatively new, unproven company

See full review

Savings tip: Clearwave Fiber often has sign-up promotions for first-time customers. Call to ask a rep about current deals and discounts.

Check deals

Staff rating

3.6

Budget-friendly internet in Mississippi and Alabama

MaxxSouth Broadband delivers fast, reliable cable and fiber internet to much of Mississippi and some of Alabama. The internet service provider (ISP) packs a ton of value in its plans, especially for smaller households. But if you want top-notch customer service, this might not be the company for you.

What we like

Low prices
Fast, reliable plans
Inexpensive professional installation

What we dislike

Poor customer service
No self-setup option
Limited availability

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Savings tip: MaxxSouth Broadband often has sign-up promotions for first-time customers. Call to ask a rep about current deals and discounts.

Check deals

Staff rating

4.1

Fast speeds and reasonable pricing

If you can get fiber internet from Optimum , you'll get great all-around service with fast speeds and reasonable pricing. If you can get only cable internet, you'll get slower max speeds and may see different pricing. Both options are decent, but watch out for third-year price hikes and potential customer service hassles.

What we like

Affordable prices
No data caps or contracts
Both cable and fiber offerings

What we dislike

Very limited availability
Average customer service
No true budget plan

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Savings tip: Optimum often has sign-up promotions for first-time customers. Call to ask a rep about current deals and discounts.

Check deals

Value

3.5

Solid value and transparent pricing

Clearwave Fiber fares decently overall in the value department, in large part because fiber just tends to be a good value. With faster plans, like Fiber 1 Gig, Clearwave is competitive and the performance is excellent. This package offers 11.75 Mbps per dollar spent, compared to the Fiber 500 plan at 6.67 Mbps per dollar. Although the latter is cheaper per month, you can clearly see how you get more for each dollar spent with the top-tier plan.

However, compared to competitors like AT&T, Clearwave is definitely more expensive. This difference is more pronounced with the lower-tier packages, where you get a lot more for your money with other providers.

It’s not all bad news, however. You do get unlimited data on all the plans by default—some providers, notably Xfinity, charge quite a lot for this. The equipment costs are also low, at $10 per month.

Additionally, while the price does increase after 12 months, the bump is relatively small at just $15 per month. Clearwave is very up front about this, which is a refreshing change—normally we have to dig to find out how much a plan’s price will increase after promotional periods end.

Pricing details vary by location. Visit

Clearwave Fiber's website

or call to speak with a rep.

See pricing

Value

3.0

Low prices for the speed you can actually use

MaxxSouth offers plans ranging from 150 Mbps to an incredible 10 gigs. However, anything above 1 gig isn't yet widely available, and for good reason. Most households don't need near those speeds, and current devices can't use it anyway. So stick with MaxxSouth's 1 gig plans or lower. In fact, the slower your plan, the better the deal you get with MaxxSouth. A 150 Mbps plan costs just 28% of the national benchmark, while a 1 gig plan runs about 67% of the national benchmark (which is still a good deal). (1)

Plans come with unlimited data, decent upload speeds, and inexpensive equipment and installation—all with no contract. That’s a ton of value!

Pricing details vary by location. Visit

MaxxSouth Broadband's website

or call 1-844-719-0032 to speak with a rep.

See pricing

Value

4.0

A lot of internet for a little money

Optimum offers a lot for the money. Both fiber and cable internet plans start at 300–500 Mbps, with a very competitive price that beats the entry-level plan for competitor Spectrum and is way less than national benchmarks (1). That's plenty fast for most online gaming and work from home needs, but you can pay for even higher speeds if you have a big household.

Compared to the competition, the two lower-tier plans almost always offer more speed for the money. And while you can technically find cheaper gig plans, Optimum still tends to be the most affordable in its markets.

If you qualify only for cable internet with Optimum, your speeds will be slower but you'll pay about the same every month. Prices are higher than other cable internet providers at these speeds, but you may not have a choice. Most areas that don't have fiber internet won't have multiple cable internet options.

We love the low starting prices, 2-year price lock, and 60-day money back guarantee, but you can expect prices to jump $35–$85 in your third year of service.

Pricing details vary by location. Visit

Optimum's website

or call 1-844-719-8066 to speak with a rep.

See pricing

Performance

5.0

Fast fiber speeds and unlimited data

Clearwave Fiber does better in the performance department. Speeds are fast—up to 1 Gbps—and all the fiber plans offer symmetrical speeds. This means the download and upload speeds are the same.

With something like cable your upload is normally about 10% of your download speed, if that. This helps a lot with live streaming, video calls, and sharing large files like videos.

As for reliability, fiber is generally pretty solid. However, Clearwave is a newer company, so it’s hard to say how well the service will hold up. Here’s what we can say: in some markets, Clearwave has taken over Hargray’s fiber services, which we have found to be somewhat unreliable in the past. Hopefully Clearwave makes improvements for customers going forward.

Available speeds vary by location. Call to speak with a Clearwave Fiber rep or

go to its website.

Performance

5.0

High-performance cable and fiber internet plans

MaxxSouth Broadband offers cable and fiber internet plans, both of which are highly reliable. MaxxSouth’s cable plans range from 150 Mbps to 1 gig download speeds, with upload speeds from 5 Mbps to 15 Mbps, which is better than a lot of other providers.

Some MaxxSouth fiber plans boast a whopping 10 gigs (holy cannoli!) with symmetrical connections (meaning the upload speeds match the download speeds). However, it's more realistic to see actual speeds max out at around 1 gig, even if you buy a faster plan. With 10 gigs, you could host the mother of all LAN parties (can we join?) and still have mountains of leftover bandwidth.

Available speeds vary by location. Call 1-844-719-0032 to speak with a MaxxSouth Broadband rep or

go to its website.

Performance

5.0

Optimum internet is both fast and reliable—what’s not to love?

Optimum performance is solid. With speeds up to 2 Gbps (12000 Mbps) in some states, there’s enough bandwidth available for even the heaviest of streaming households. Even the lowest-tier plans offer plenty of speed for most use cases. The cable service is generally very reliable, as well, and usually even faster than advertised, with better latency than any cable competitor. (2)

Additionally, Optimum offers fiber internet service in some of its coverage areas, which offers extra reliability and symmetrical speeds. That’s an excellent feature for content creators and anyone who shares a lot of large media files. Recently, it started offering home internet plans up to 5 Gbps, a speed that’s nearly impossible to beat.

Available speeds vary by location. Call 1-844-719-8066 to speak with a Optimum rep or

go to its website.

Equipment and installation

3.5

No surprises here

Clearwave Fiber offers what it calls the Clearwave Fiber Router. Combined with a whole-home Wi-Fi system and a smartphone app, customers are promised wall-to-wall coverage and a slew of features to help make the experience better. These include individual profiles for people and rooms, bandwidth tests, guest networks, and parental controls. That’s a pretty solid package for $10 per month.

Installation is the typical fiber deal—you’ll need a tech to come out and install the Optical Network Terminal (ONT), which is basically the modem for your fiber network. After that, you can either use Clearwave’s router or bring your own. There’s a $99 installation fee, which is pretty standard.

Equipment and installation options can vary widely depending on

Clearwave Fiber plans

available in your area.

View plans

Equipment and installation

4.0

Low-cost installation and quality gear

MaxxSouth has minimal equipment and installation costs. A router/modem combo is included in your plan’s pricing, which is a rare find indeed. If you have a large home or a big family, though, you probably want to spring for this provider’s eero TrueMesh Wi-Fi, which uses multiple signal extenders placed throughout your home for the best coverage. At a reasonable $15 per month, this Wi-Fi package also includes an app that helps you find and eliminate dead spots, set parental controls, and even gives you access to remote support.

MaxxSouth’s professional installation will cost you around $20 in most cases, though if your home isn’t quite internet ready, this cost could go up. Since professional installation usually costs $70–$100 even for plug-and-play homes, that’s a sweet deal. The downside is that there’s no free self-install option, which means you’ll have to schedule an appointment. But there are worse trade-offs.

Equipment and installation options can vary widely depending on

MaxxSouth Broadband plans

available in your area.

View plans

Equipment and installation

4.5

Free pro and self-installs, or you can pay for extra device setup

Optimum offers a fairly standard wireless gateway with both its fiber and cable plans. The combined modem and router are usually free, but may cost you $10 per month on top of your bill in some areas. You can also add Wi-Fi extenders for $3 each per month, which is handy for larger homes and offices (and not a bad price, either).

If you want to use your own equipment instead of Optimum's free gear, you may run into difficulties. Optimum doesn't list compatible equipment and requires at least some third-party modems to be purchased from its stores.

With Optimum installation, you can do it yourself or have a pro help, and either way is free. If you order online, you can opt for a free standard professional installation or pay $59 for a premium installation, where the tech will configure Wi-Fi on up to six devices for you. While other providers may offer to set up your main device during installation, we haven’t seen such an extensive guarantee elsewhere. This could be a selling point for less tech-savvy customers.

Equipment and installation options can vary widely depending on

Optimum plans

available in your area.

View plans

Customer experience

3.5

Quick and helpful service

Since Clearwave is fairly new, the customer experience is a bit of a question mark. We’ve not seen a ton of user comments about the provider, but the few we have seen have been generally positive, citing good reliability, lack of data caps, and local customer support. This includes both former Hargray customers as well as new Clearwave customers.

Additionally, while the company’s website lacks self-help options, we chatted with customer service reps several times and were able to consistently get a response within a minute or two. The reps were direct, helpful, and friendly, and we appreciated the speed of the responses.

Visit Clearwave Fiber's website

or call for more information on contracts and money-back guarantees.

Go to provider

Customer Experience

2.5

Decent self-help options, but customer service needs improvement

We love that installation is just $20 in most cases and that you can call into MaxxSouth customer service 24/7/365. However, some of the customer reviews suggest that the low price and availability aren’t all they’re cracked up to be. Multiple reviews cite technicians leaving holes in walls, unsightly cables, or non-functioning internet in their wake, while others say it’s hard to get a person on the phone when they call in.

MaxxSouth has some decent self-help content on its website to help you troubleshoot issues on your own, but not all issues can be solved this way. We’d love to see MaxxSouth’s customer service rise to the level of its value in other areas.

Visit MaxxSouth Broadband's website

or call 1-844-719-0032 for more information on contracts and money-back guarantees.

Go to provider

Customer experience

3.0

Great internet brought down by customer service complaints

Optimum provides a good customer experience overall. Both types—cable and fiber—are fast and stable, and we haven’t seen any major complaints about reliability. We think the day-to-day experience with Optimum is fine.

However, the company’s customer service is less than stellar, with one of the lowest ratings of all providers, according to the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) (3). Most of the complaints we’ve seen involve a poor experience dealing with customer service reps. Optimum does offer solid online support options, so you may be able to get around these issues. And, of course, not everyone has a poor experience.

Visit Optimum's website

or call 1-844-719-8066 for more information on contracts and money-back guarantees.

Go to provider

Made up your mind?

Find out what providers are available near you.

Clearwave Fiber

0.0

(0)

5 Star

4 Star

3 Star

2 Star

1 Star

MaxxSouth Broadband

0.0

(0)

5 Star

4 Star

3 Star

2 Star

1 Star

Optimum

3.8

(70)

5 Star

26%

4 Star

46%

3 Star

16%

2 Star

1 Star

Debbiefrom Cullowhee, NC

Optimum Customer for 1+ years

Reviewed on: 6-17-2022

Reliable with few issues. Just wish the cost wasn’t so much.

Bobbifrom Bridgeport, CT

Optimum Customer for 8+ years

Reviewed on: 6-17-2022

I am very satisfy with my service .I been a customer for years.They are a good value and very reliable.

Lyndafrom Sod, WV

Optimum Customer for 1+ years

Reviewed on: 6-17-2022

Optimum currently provides a fast and mostly reliable internet connection. However, the price is not a value at all.

Janetfrom Bronx, NY

Optimum Customer for 8+ years

Reviewed on: 6-17-2022

very good service. always available in my area. a sure deal

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Endnotes and sources

1. “2022 Urban Rate Survey – Fixed Broadband Service,” FCC. Accessed 1 February 2023.

Endnotes and sources

1. “2022 Urban Rate Survey – Fixed Broadband Service,” FCC. Accessed 20 October 2022.2. "Measuring Broadband America," FCC. Retreieved Dec. 10, 2022.3. “Internet Service Providers,” American Customer Satisfaction Index. Accessed 15 June 2022.