Easiest monthly expense to reduce (that no one talks about)

We’ve all heard the usual advice for how to cut monthly expenses. Cancel subscriptions. Make coffee at home. Stop eating out so much. It’s not bad advice, but these tips to reduce expenses tend to zero in on the “fun stuff” and overlook the boring line items on your monthly bills that you probably wouldn’t mind cutting.

In fact, there’s a household expense you could spend less on today, without changing a single habit or giving anything up. And chances are, you haven’t thought twice about it in years.

We’re talking about your monthly phone bill. Here’s why.

Your landline home phone service is costing more than you think

Most people see their home phone bill as an inflexible monthly cost—something to pay and forget about. But if you’re still on a traditional landline running over copper wires (also called POTS, or Plain Old Telephone Service), you’re likely paying a phone bill that’s between $40 to $70 a month. That’s up to $840 a year, with the costs only getting higher.

The cost of residential home phone service rose 48 percent from January 2015 to May 2025, outpacing the overall inflation rate of 36 percent in the same period. Why is this happening? Because copper phone lines are being phased out.

In less than two decades, PSTN lines across the U.S. plummeted by 93 percent, from 171 million in 2005 to just 11.7 million in 2024. AT&T, the nation’s largest POTS line provider, has set 2029 as its target date to retire nearly all of its remaining POTS infrastructure.

With fewer customers still using POTS, carriers are stuck maintaining expensive infrastructure with shrinking revenue. As a result, they’re quietly passing those costs on to the loyal customers who haven’t switched yet.

In other words, while prices keep climbing, you’re not getting anything new for it. You’re simply subsidizing a system that’s on its way out. If you’ve been looking for a painless way to reduce living expenses, your landline is the place to start.

Why switching your home phone service is simpler than cutting other monthly expenses

Conventional advice on how to reduce household expenses often leads to lifestyle changes. You’re either cutting back on dining out, figuring out how to stay active after canceling a gym membership or skipping out on that annual vacation.

But more than being inconvenient, these changes quickly make budgeting feel like punishment. Cutting small indulgences like a morning latte or avocado toast can quickly lead to feelings of deprivation and burnout, which makes it harder to stay the course and can even take a toll on mental health along the way.

On the other hand, switching your traditional home phone service to VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) doesn’t require sacrifice. It’s a one-time action that pays off every single month after that. In most cases, you get to keep your home phone and your number, so nothing about your daily routine changes. You just stop overpaying to make and receive calls at home.

Modern VoIP home phone services work over your existing internet connection and can cost a fraction of what a copper landline charges. With Ooma, for example, you pay a one-time hardware cost and then as little as $0/month for Basic service (just taxes and fees), with an optional Premier plan for added features.

What changes (and what doesn’t) when you switch to VoIP

Saving money by ditching the expensive home phone line sounds great in theory. But what are you actually giving up?

Truthfully, not much, but there are a few changes to be aware of.

When you switch your home phone to a VoIP service, call quality is often the same or even better than what you’re used to and you can keep your existing phone number through a simple porting process. On the hardware side, your current handsets can often plug right in, but if not, an adapter is typically all you need to get them working. If 911 access is a concern, modern VoIP home phone services include Enhanced 911, so emergency services can locate you just as they would on a traditional line.

What does change is reliability—in a good way. Copper lines have seen a decline in reliability as carriers cut back on infrastructure maintenance, with weather events increasingly leading to service outages. In contrast, a modern VoIP service runs over your existing internet connection, which is now far more reliable than aging copper wiring.

Beyond that, VoIP also comes with some upgrades to the calling experience. With a modern home VoIP service, you can get new features that copper landlines don’t support, such as a free calling app that lets you make and receive calls on your smartphone from your home number or advanced call blocking to filter out robocalls and spam.

Switching to VoIP is one of the easiest ways to cut living expenses

When people search for ways to cut living expenses, they’re often looking for something painless. Your home phone bill is exactly that: a typical monthly expense that most assume is fixed, when it’s actually one of the easiest to reduce.

Ready to see how much you could save? Check out our savings calculator for home telephone service.