Sonic Internet Logo
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4.7

Overall Score

Author: Kaitlyn Short

LAST UPDATED: August 14th, 2024

Based in the San Francisco Bay Area of California, Sonic Internet offers download speeds up to 20 Mbps, no data caps, and a one-year contract.

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As an internet provider, Sonic Internet's mission is simple: to provide the best internet speed and great customer service for the most affordable price. The company strives to accomplish its mission by continually innovating and working to change the face of the broadband service industry.

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The Good

  • Brand New Fiber-Optic Lines
  • No Data Limits

Brand New Fiber-Optic Lines

Sonic Internet's service lines are brand new in every area where the company operates. This means that the lines are using the most current fiber optic technology, which keeps the network constantly running at full speed. Some players in the internet service provider industry will vary in speed depending on the time of day, so users may not be getting the actual speed that they are paying for each month. However, Sonic Internet customers do not have to worry about this issue. Fiber internet service is considered the most reliable connection.

No Data Limits

Some ISP companies set limits on how much data their customers can use each month. Sonic Internet does not impose any data caps on its customers' usage. Each Sonic customer can use as much data as desired each month while still enjoying quick speeds.

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The Bad

  • 12-Month Contract
  • Limited Service Area
  • Slow Speeds

12-Month Contract

While several other internet providers do not require any contracts, Sonic Internet requires its customers to sign into a minimum 12-month agreement in order to utilize the company's services. If the customer needs to cancel the internet connection for any reason before the end of the contract, they will be required to pay an early termination fee.

Limited Service Area

Sonic Internet's service area is incredibly limited; the company only operates in a few cities in California. Not only does this restrict the number of consumers who have access to Sonic Internet's services, but it also makes it difficult for existing Sonic customers who move outside of the company's service area because they have to deal with the hassle of switching providers and cancelling their contract.

Slow Speeds

Sonic Internet's top download speed is 20 Mbps, which is incredibly slow in the industry. Many other companies offer more than 20 Mbps as their bottom speed and go as fast as 1 Gbps.

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The Bottom Line

Sonic offers its customers fiber internet and no data limits. However, the company's service area is limited to a few cities in California, the speeds are very slow, and its customers are required to sign into a 12-month contract. We do not recommend working with Sonic Internet at this time.

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Star Rating

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3.1

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44 Reviews

Review Breakdown

5 grade

41%

4 grade

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3 grade

11%

2 grade

23%

1 grade

25%

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Anne L. Grenier

Their tech customer service is very rude most of the time with a few exceptions. The internet goes down every few months without notice so once again tried the drill of unplugging and plugging back in to see if wld restart. Did on downstairs wifi beacon first- didn’t work. Then tried upstairs when saw that one was down also —didn’t work. So called the Tech customer service — rudest woman yet — wouldn’t give me chance to explain, kept cutting me off mid sentence and claiming the system was down because it was unplugged. When I repeated explaining it went down before I unplugged it and asked her to check the time record for about 10 min before the unplugging to see why it went down she just kept said “I know how to do my job” and we show it was down because it was unplugged. Nope— it went down in the middle of watching a streamed movie, and when I check both units they were both red indicating off line. No one likes a condescending tech support. Sonic is cheaper than AT&T and ComCast but their tech support reps are just awful comparatively!

9 months ago

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Eric LaFranchi Windsor, CA

Sonic has a 1.5 GB limit on email storage which is ridiculous while other companies offer 15GBs for free and more for a minimal fee. My family had 6 Sonic email accounts (Sonic mailboxes) with total storage usage of 14GB and I was being charged $200.00 a month for overage. After multiple email and calls to support, I was told that Sonic would not address the mail storage limits. When I pointed out that several other email services offered 15GB for free and 50-100s gigabytes for minimal monthly or annual change, I was told by customer service to go to another service. My conclusion is that Sonic doesn’t care about the customer and just moves on with their new services and ditches the existing customer that help Sonic to grow into what it is today.

2 years ago

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Mimi Lain San Francisco, CA

I've had it with Xfinity, they raise prices too often and too fast, their customer service is unremarkable so I heard Sonic is a great alternative. I saw the online promotion indicating 3 months of free service and $49.99 monthly charge for the 2nd tier service, I decided to switch. The online order was simple and easy, but without a lot of explanation until you've signed up. That should have been a sign... The installation was a no show at first by AT&T they've contracted, finally, the AT&T guy showed up and installed the gateway 3 days later, I had to plug in the telephone gadget although I didn't need a landline. I ordered two "eeros" for $19.95 / month rental for I thought it was a gadget required but later returned them for I am able to use my own google wifi as extenders. Nonetheless, I was charged $75.99 for the first month, I called and asked, the guy asked me to call back when Accounting is working, I called again, the woman explained that the 3 month free promotion was only for "Sonic Fiber optic" which was not available in my area, so they had to do it by contracting with AT&T with a node, so it is not real fiber option, and I have to pay additional $16/ month on top of the $49.99 to rent the gateway and phone jack - that was a surprise! I can pay for the gateway but for a phone jack I don't need? They claimed the landline comes "free", I felt deceived for none of these were explained to me before the order was placed! without placing the order, you have no info regarding their policies. I have a bad feeling about this. However, the internet has been working fine, but I will wait and see if I will keep this company - after one month I am bound to a one-year contract!!

4 years ago

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Jan Robertson Burlingame, CA

We've had it for 7 years. Generally has been good BUT recently two major failures. One was an emergency they knew about on a Sunday but did nothing to fix it until Monday morning! Now they have given us notice that tomorrow, a Friday morning, they have a SCHEDULED "emergency" maintenance. Are you kidding me, on a weekday? Don't they know that lots of people work from home and rely on internet for business to do their jobs? Especially on a Friday when many 'hybrid' workers work from home. Sonic if you do this again we need to seriously think about switching!

1 year ago

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Rosemary King San Francisco, CA

Just had Sonic installed to replace increased cost of ATT internet. SONIC ADS ARE LIES. There is no residential $39.99 plan, and despite a lined through RentalBoxFee indicating no such charge, there is a $10 fee for equipment rental, a $10 fee for a phone line I did not want, as well as other fees adding up to $66/month - MORE than my last service! There is no truth to their advertising which is intentionally misleading.

2 years ago

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Josh Sacramento, CA

Was a customer for 7 years, about as slow as any other internet in the Bay Area. You start off paying $40 a month for about a year and by the end we were paying $90 a month without any upgrades in speed. Service never cut out which was a plus. Just be aware they ask for a 30 day notice before ending service, then charge you a lot of extra fees at the end even though we returned all the equipment. Probably the same experience of any of these large internet companies, just wish we had high speed, public internet some small towns are pulling off that isn't run by shady companies.

4 years ago

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Bruce Wallace

Their customer service is generally good, and the signal pretty reliable, but they have been charging me for a piece of equipment I don’t have for a year-and-a-half. If you use them I suggest thoroughly documenting everything you get from them, including with photographs.

1 year ago

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Arthur Weiss Berkeley, CA

The service is great but the attractive prices are a joke. They say they will charge $39.99 and then when you add the basic equipment to make it work, it jumps to more than $60.00. After a year it gets worse going up to $70.00 which is the same I previously paid for xfinity. I am really questioning whether it is worth it or not.

2 years ago

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Xin Cho Berkeley, CA

They advertise 39.99 internet+phone and then charge you an extra 12.90 as 'taxes and fees' for the phone. This is for first year, and afterwards they charge you an extra 10.00 too. This was scummy and not made clear it'd that the charge wouldn't show up until later. Good speeds though, but it's disconnected twice since I've had service.

3 years ago

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MICHAEL WOODS San Francisco, CA

1 Mbps download and 0.5 Mbps upload for about $63 per month in San Francisco.

6 years ago