Verizon's awesome 'broken phone' deal is back with a bang to give T-Mobile a run for its money

Verizon had a pretty good second quarter of the year, reporting "increased" 5G adoption and a grand total of 197,000 phone net additions, but while you normally can't have that kind of growth without getting a number of different things right, this particular surge was largely attributed by analysts to a killer promotion kicked off at the very beginning of Q2.

Because all good things must eventually come to an end, Big Red decided to discontinue its "biggest 5G upgrade campaign ever", which made the aforementioned analysts wonder if the carrier could keep up its growth rate going forward.

Realizing that was unlikely to be the case, however, Verizon has just announced the revival of the "broken phone" deal. Technically, this is not the exact same offer as all the way back in April, but from one key perspective, it's even better.

Massive trade-in savings and a phenomenal port-in deal

While you "only" qualify for up to an $800 trade-in credit this time around rather than the full $1,000 initially thrown in by Verizon in an attempt to steal T-Mobile's thunder (and subscribers), you can now combine that with a port-in Virtual Prepaid Mastercard worth a maximum of $500 as well.

Yup, ladies and gents, you can save up to an insane $1300 on one of Verizon's "best 5G phones" today... with the right trade-in and a large enough final bill from your existing wireless service provider. That $500 is meant to cover your network switching costs, mind you, with the additional $800 discount bringing the list price of a "regular" Samsung Galaxy S21 5G down to... $0.

That's just one example, of course, with many of the overall best phones out there available at a huge discount from Big Red, including the Galaxy S21+, S21 Ultra, Note 20 Ultra, Motorola Edge+, and all three iPhone 12-series devices.

That being said, it's definitely important to point out that the 5G-enabled iPhone markdown caps off at 700 bucks, and while you can trade in everything from a fully functional to a cracked and even water damaged handset, the value of your promo credit applied over two years will depend on the model you're looking to get rid of.

But wait, there's more... requirements

Last but certainly not least, you should keep in mind that a new line of service on a "select" Unlimited plan is also required for both new and existing Verizon customers seeking up to $800 for their raggedy old smartphone. So, yeah, the awesome new renewed deal does come with a couple of strings attached, but nothing too inconvenient or unusual.

Meanwhile, the extra carrier switching offer, which you're obviously not forced to combine with the broken phone promo if you don't want to, is clearly targeted at T-Mobile's Carrier Freedom deal.

Still, Magenta remains pretty much unrivaled in terms of port-in value, covering up to $650 per line (for up to five lines) on your outstanding device payment balance if you want to turn your back on Verizon or AT&T for some reason. Furthermore, although T-Mo won't take your broken device, two of the best budget 5G phones around can be yours completely free of charge with any trade-in. Yes, even a good old fashioned "dumb" flip phone.

Going back to Verizon's terms and conditions, switching customers need to remember to visit this webpage after ordering their new $699.99+ phone. You'll have to upload your final bill and enter a promo code that will be emailed within two weeks of your purchase there, and file your request for up to a $500 Virtual Prepaid Mastercard within 60 days of activation.