You may have noticed that many different providers offer incredibly low prices for broadband in their advertising, and be pulled in by the idea of only having to pay a few pounds to receive a high speed internet service. However, when looking at the small print it's pretty obvious that the actual price you'll be paying is much higher because the company requires you to take out monthly phone line rental with them at the same time. Even if you don't want to use your phone line for anything but broadband, you can still be looking at having to pay a monthly sum for the line itself before even thinking about the broadband service charge on top.

There's no easy way around not having a landline, however. Most providers in the UK use a technology called ADSL, which provides broadband across the existing phone line network. This technology is popular because it's cheap and easy to access, with around 98% of homes being able to access some form of ADSL. However, ADSL is also an old technology that relies on copper to transfer data, making it slow and requiring an already installed landline to function. Nearly all of the big providers from BT to Sky to TalkTalk use this technology, so if you plan on getting broadband from any of those providers, you'll be stuck paying line rental.

The alternative is cable technology, but there's far fewer options available here. While some cities such as Bournemouth and Dundee have their own cable technology set up already, the only national provider is Virgin Media, and even then the Virgin Media cable network is only available in around 50% of the country and is pretty much impossible to find outside of major towns. The service does offer some brilliant speeds though, thanks to the use of the much newer and flexible fibre optic technology. The Virgin service means that you can ditch the landline, but unfortunately, there's a pretty big catch.

Virgin Broadband isn't actually very cheap as a standalone product, so while you can purchase a broadband only package from the company, you'll find that you'll be paying about as much as line rental and broadband combined on another provider. This means that if your main reason to try and escape the landline was cash, you really aren't gaining by selecting Virgin Media. Of course, Virgin does offer great value for money if you consider a bundle deal where you pay for phone, TV and broadband together, but then you're essentially back to square one and stuck with a landline again.

The other option to get rid of the landline is to use a mobile broadband connection in your own home. Because mobile broadband uses 3G signal rather than any sort of wires, you don't need to worry about paying for a landline at all, and as you can sign up to mobile broadband from your phone provider, you can often get it for a decent price, too. There's a number of different options available for mobile broadband, and unlike fixed line broadband you can actually get mobile broadband on as 'Pay as you Go' (PAYG) service rather than on a lengthy contract, which is a big advantage for students or people that travel often.

However, broadband no landline does have a number of significant disadvantages. It's far slower than fixed line broadband and slower still indoors, so you'll be stuck with poor speeds. It's also a far more restrictive service overall, with bandwidth limits that control how much you can download every month. 5GB is considered a generous allowance for mobile broadband, while a similar price land line tariff might offer 60GB, or not even have any limit at all. For these reasons, you might simply find that sucking it up and paying out the money for a landline will lead to a better broadband experience overall.