Internet. Power. Mobile. Water. Groceries. Baby formula. Your nan. All on one enormous bill, all on one 72-month term, all impossible to leave. It's the Kiwi way.†
* Packet loss is a natural feature of the New Zealand landscape and is not covered by any guarantee.† "The Kiwi way" is a registered trademark of Snail Holdings (Cayman) Ltd. Speeds shown are theoretical, measured at 4:15am on a public holiday, on our engineer's laptop, plugged directly into the exchange, in a different country.
Within spec (spec: 0–100%)
Routed via Gore
Yours is shared, and it is in Gore
On track. Still.
Award-winning infrastructure
4 years running. Unopposed in all four.
‡ Litigation volume is a measure of engagement.◆ The Better Than Australia's Fibre Rollout Award is administered by Snail.NZ, judged by Snail.NZ, and entered by Snail.NZ. No Australian network was tested, contacted, or informed.
Selected from 41,000 pieces of feedback by our Sentiment Curation Team
Broadband plans
* Prices shown exclude GST, the Broadband Levy, the Rural Levy (applies in Ponsonby), the $49 Connection Admin Fee, the $12 Paper Bill Fee, the $12 Paperless Bill Fee, and the $99 fee for reading this sentence.
For people who have wronged us.
$89/mo
then $134/mo after month 3, forever
◆ "Unlimited" means unlimited up to 400GB, after which we shape you to 1.5 Mbps and describe this internally as "the Trickle experience".
Our most popular plan.
$129/mo
then $189/mo, then +CPI +9% every April
◆ 900 Mbps measured downstream of the congestion, upstream of the truth.
For people who read the brochure and believed it.
$299/mo
then $399/mo after month 3, forever
◆ 4 Gbps is the theoretical maximum of the ONT, the router and the will to believe, all at once.
You will not need another provider. Or another decision.
$22,982/mo
mortgage included at $11,491/mo, plus everything in the fine print
◆ Formula plan auto-renews for 18 years regardless of whether a baby is present, arrives, or consents.
Build your bundle
* "Save" here refers to a saving experienced by Snail.NZ.
$0/mo
Tick a service to get started.
By clicking you agree to the Terms, the Other Terms, the Terms that supersede the Other Terms, and to be contacted by us on channels you have unsubscribed from.
Sign a 72-month Everything Bundle and we'll send you a television. It is very smart. It has one HDMI port, and the remote controls a different television.
📺† TV ships within 90 business days of month 13. If you cancel before month 72 the full $329 RRP becomes immediately payable, plus a $75 Gift Recovery Fee, plus freight both ways, plus a $40 fee for us having to think about the TV again. The TV is not covered by warranty, consumer guarantee, or hope. Smart features are supplied by the manufacturer, who is not us, and require all three accounts to remain active. Advertising revenue is ours.
Snail EarPoints™
* Once Pre-paid Funeral coverage is active. Not before.
EarPoints accrue automatically once Pre-paid Funeral is ticked in your Everything Bundle†. The rate is set by how many other services you're carrying alongside it, which our actuaries call engagement. Untick the funeral and accrual stops immediately. The balance you already earned stays exactly where it was.
Earn rate
0/sec
1 EarPoint per ticked service, per second.
Redemption from
4,000
One 780g tin of formula. Some months, whey.
Points expire
Annually
Or at payout. Whichever comes first.
† EarPoints cannot be redeemed for flights, seats, upgrades, luggage, or travel of any kind. They were originally earned per flight sector, declared to Kōura within 4 minutes of landing, Tuesdays 3:00 to 3:04am only. That scheme was discontinued in favour of the funeral requirement. EarPoints are named for the ear, which is where flying was felt.
0
Locked. Requires Pre-paid Funeral coverage.
Tier: Bronze. There is only Bronze.
Claims are assessed by the Sentiment Curation Team and are final at the point of assessment.
Your gigabit Ethernet port is rated at 1,000 Mbps. A single AetherPod X9 is rated at 11,000 Mbps.
Cables are legacy. Cables are latency. Cables are furniture. AetherPod™ removes every cable in your home for $0/mo per pod, in exchange for 6 to 24 months added to your term, per pod.
| Ethernet (legacy) | AetherPod X9 | |
|---|---|---|
| Rated speed | 1,000 | 11,000 |
| How that's measured | end to end, sustained, one device | every band on every pod, both directions, simultaneously, in a lab, no walls |
| Cables required | 1 | 0 |
| Latency | 0.3ms | 61ms |
| Self-healing | no | yes |
| Has an app | no | yes |
| Monthly cost | $0 | $0 |
| Term added | none | +6 to +24 mo per pod |
| Verdict | slower | FASTER |
Ethernet's figure is the speed one device actually gets. AetherPod's figure is every radio added together.
3 rooms
Pods recommended
7
by our Sales team
Monthly rental
$0
genuinely free, non-optional
Added to your term
+84 mo
12 months per pod
Throughput at pod #7
14.1
Mbps, after Coverage Multiplication™
Verdict
Still faster than Ethernet ✓
Ethernet would have delivered 1,000 Mbps down a $12 cable. Ethernet cannot self-heal.
⚪Dual-band. Entry level. Two-pod minimum, three-pod recommendation, four-pod outcome.
+6 months per pod
🔷Tri-band. One band is reserved for Dedicated Backhaul™, which is shared.
+12 months per pod
🗿1.1 metres of matte basalt-effect polymer. No lights. No ports. No explanation.
+24 months per pod
Dedicated Backhaul™
A radio band dedicated exclusively to backhaul, and to your devices, and to your neighbour's AetherPods.
Coverage Multiplication™
Every additional pod doubles your coverage and halves your throughput.
AetherMind™ AI
Continuously optimises your network by rebooting it at 3:04am, which is also when you can reach us by phone.
WiFi 8-Ready™
WiFi 8 does not exist. When it does, AetherPod will not support it.
Layered Address Protection™
Every pod translates your address again. Each one is another private network you are behind.
MAC-Locked™
Your fibre connection only speaks to the MAC address of a Snail.NZ AetherPod. Plug in your own router and the light goes green anyway.
◆ All AetherPod™ speed figures are the arithmetic sum of the theoretical maximum PHY rate of every radio in the device, in both directions, on all bands, at once. No device has ever achieved them and none ever will. Real-world throughput depends on walls, weather, neighbours, the number of pods you were sold, and whether AetherMind™ is currently optimising. Pods must be placed at least 4m apart but no closer than 3.5m, at least 1.2m from walls, floors, ceilings and other AetherPods, a set of conditions our own engineers concede cannot be simultaneously satisfied. Firmware updates weekly, take 40 minutes, and are scheduled for 7pm. AetherPod™ does not support IPv6. Neither do we. Pods are rented, never owned, must be returned in original packaging, and remain chargeable until received.
Our network
Snail.NZ operates two Points of Presence: a converted retail unit on Main Street, Gore, and a satellite terminal in Waitangi, on the Chatham Islands, 800km east of the mainland. Nearly every packet on our network still goes to Gore, is considered in Gore, and is sent back out of Gore. Whether you are in Kaitaia or Kaikōura, your traffic goes to Gore first.
🏢Primary POP: Main Street, Gore.
📡Failover POP: Waitangi, Chatham Islands. Has taken over live national traffic twice.
Day to day, Waitangi reaches the mainland over the AetherPod SeaMesh Fleet™, a relay of AetherPod™ units carried on fishing and supply boats scattered across the Chatham Rise, each pod handing the signal to the next boat within range until it reaches shore. Every pod runs on a solar panel bolted to the wheelhouse roof, backed by a two-stroke diesel generator for nights, fog, and salt spray, swapped for a three-stroke generator in winter, when a two-stroke is not considered sufficient.
A relay of that length needs 13,334 boats, at the AetherPod™'s rated 60 metres of line of sight over open water, rounded up because a boat cannot be moored in thirds. The fleet is 41. The remaining 13,293 positions are not a gap in coverage. They are unallocated ocean.
Points of Presence
2
Gore, and the Chathams
Auckland to Auckland, via Gore
3,400km
Same suburb. Scenic route.
SeaMesh boats required
13,334
800km ÷ 60m of rated range. The fleet is 41.
Shared wall with
bakery
Their oven is on our circuit
you@home:~$ traceroute 169.254.169.254 (neighbour's router, 11 metres away)
1 192.168.3.1 0.9 ms (AetherPod #3, your room) 2 172.16.5.1 88.4 ms (Obelisk #2, meshing anyway) 3 10.9.4.1 94.6 ms (AetherPod #1, your router) 4 100.64.0.1 101 ms (CGNAT, also you) 5 100.64.12.9 111 ms (CGNAT, also you, again) 6 100.64.31.4 118 ms (CGNAT, still you) 7 gor-agg-01.net.snail.nz 148 ms 8 gor-core-01.net.snail.nz 201 ms 9 gor-core-02.net.snail.nz 244 ms 10 gor-pe-01.net.snail.nz 288 ms 11 * * * (reoptimising) 12 gor-pe-02.net.snail.nz 331 ms 13 169.254.169.254 347 ms (neighbour) --- 13 packets transmitted, 8 received, 38% packet loss --- Status: WITHIN NORMAL PARAMETERS. Ticket auto-closed.
Each AetherPod™ runs its own network address translation, and chooses its own private range, so every pod you were sold is another private network your traffic crosses before it reaches ours. From there you sit behind three layers of CGNAT with roughly 4,000 other households, all of whom appear to the internet as a single address in Gore. Benefits include no port forwarding, no self-hosting, no working game invites, and being blocked by websites because a stranger in Invercargill misbehaved on Tuesday.
A dedicated public IPv4 is available for $25/mo, or $25/mo, or $25/mo.
Our IPv6 rollout is progressing well. We have a slide about it. The slide has a globe on it. Our core cannot carry it, our billing system cannot store it, and nobody in Gore has asked. You may enable IPv6 below at any time.
99.9% uptime*
* Of our billing system.
Peering
We peer in Gore, with our transit provider, who is also in Gore.
Traffic management
We do not throttle. We prioritise other customers ahead of you.
Award-winning support
* "Here" is a data centre in another hemisphere. "You" is a queue position.
0800 SNAIL (0800 762 45)
Instant answers.
Our four-step resolution process:
Further escalation options may be available under the Telecommunications Dispute Resolution scheme. Details are provided on request, in writing, by post.
The important bit
We believe in transparency, which is why all of this is on the page and none of it is on the page you signed.
Minimum term is 72 months. The term restarts in full if you: move house, change plan, add a service, remove a service, update your email address, or speak to us.
Early Termination Fee = (remaining months × monthly charge × 1.4) + $199 Administration Recovery + the RRP of any gift + a Contract Sadness Levy determined by the retention agent handling your call.
Cancellation requires 90 days' written notice, posted, to a PO Box that was closed in 2017. Billing continues during postal transit.
Your price is fixed for 12 months, then increases by CPI + 9% every April. Fixed-term customers may not exit on a price rise, because the price rise is a term of the fixed term.
Your introductory rate ends silently. No notification will be sent, as notifications are a paid add-on ($4/mo).
Fees include: Connection Admin $49, Disconnection Admin $49, Paper Bill $12, Paperless Bill $12, Late Payment $25, Early Payment $25 (reconciliation burden), Direct Debit Dishonour $30, and a $9 Network Enhancement Levy that funds our naming-rights sponsorship of a stadium.
A $4/mo Digital Experience Levy also applies. Every other fee listed on this page is invented. This one describes something that actually happened: a person in New Zealand paid real money for the AI tokens that were spent building this website, including the sentence you are reading, and there is no mechanism anywhere on this page by which you can reimburse them.
Advertised speeds are "up to" and describe the maximum speed of the technology, not of your connection, not of our network, and not of any night on which you wish to use it.
"Unlimited" is a marketing term and does not indicate an absence of limits. Limits are set out in the Fair Use Policy, which is set out in the Acceptable Use Policy, which references the Fair Use Policy.
Packet loss below 45% is deemed "nominal" and is not a fault. Packet loss above 45% is deemed "your router" and is also not a fault.
IPv6 availability statements are forward-looking and have been forward-looking since 2011.
Removing any one service from your bundle removes the bundle discount from every service, retrospectively, for the entire term to date, payable in one instalment.
Water is supplied by your council. We bill you for it, add 14%, and call it Snail Hydro™.
Grocery boxes contain what did not sell. Baby formula subscriptions run 18 years and are non-cancellable in the event of the baby growing up, which our modelling shows is uncommon.
Baby formula and Snail 'No Whey'™ are packed on the same line by the same two people. Where one arrives labelled as the other, the delivery is deemed fulfilled, the tin is deemed food, and the term continues. Substitutions final.
Your electricity plan is on a variable rate that varies in one direction.
We may vary these terms at any time by updating this page, which you have now read, forever.
Marketing consent is bundled with service consent and cannot be unbundled, in keeping with our philosophy.
Nothing in these terms limits your rights under the Consumer Guarantees Act or the Fair Trading Act, which is why the rest of this document is written the way it is.
Check your address to get started.
Step 1 of 2. Takes 30 seconds. Lasts 72 months.
Coverage depends on your location.
We will even pay your old provider's break fees.*
* Paid as an account credit released in equal parts across months 61 to 72.