Get a free Nintendo Switch with Virgin’s P30 deals

I love my Nintendo Switch, and I’m also pretty happy with my Huawei phone. This should make me the perfect advocate for this deal from Virgin Media, where you can get the former free of charge when you take out a contract on the latter.
 
Prices start at £27 per month for the P30 Lite, but most people will want to spend at least £29 for 4GB of data. That’s £696 over the lifespan of the contract, which isn’t too bad when you break down the components: £329 P30 Lite + £280 Switch = £609.
 
But the P30 Lite is a midranger, so what happens when we look at the flagship models? Getting 4GB of data on the P30 will set you back £39.50 a month (£948 over 24 months), but if you can afford an extra £6 on your bill you can get a frankly ludicrous 50GB for a total of £1,092. The P30 sells for £699, and the Switch is still £280, so buying the two on their own would come to £979. Not too shabby.
 
Finally, there’s the P30 Pro: the top dog phone in the family with its excellent quadruple-camera array. Prices start at £47 per month for 4GB, or £53 for the 50GB package, meaning a total price of £1,128 or £1,272 over 24 months. The P30 Pro retails for £899, and the Switch price hasn’t changed since I wrote that last paragraph, so the total is £1,179. Pretty good. 
 
These are all solid enough, but by default the prices look even cheaper thanks to Virgin Media’s use of 36-month contracts by default. Avoid these like the plague: most phones, even the best flagships, aren’t cut out for two-year lifespans, and that doubly applies if you’re buying a budget phone: it’s a false economy offering you cheaper monthly payments in the short term, but a bigger bill when it’s all totted up three years later.
 
There’s also an elephant in the room, and that’s Huawei’s ongoing problems with the United States government, which has thrown the future of its Android operating system in doubt. Currently, Huawei phones that shipped with the full Googly Android experience – and that includes all the ones listed above – have been receiving OS updates as normal, but it’s up in the air as to how long that will continue. It could be indefinitely; it could stop in three months’ time.
 
If you’re happy with that gamble, then all three phones are excellent. Our head of reviews, Jonathan Bray, described the P30 Pro as representing “the very pinnacle of technological innovation” in his review. So if you fancy that and a free Nintendo Switch, then you know what to do.
 
Buy now from Virgin Media