We’ve been poring over the fine print for the Orange iPhone tariffs, number crunching and working out what all those digits mean to you. If you like streaming music over Spotify though, you’re not going to like the results: Orange’s fair use cap is restrictive, letting you listen to less than half an hour of music over 3G a day. So much for Spotify’s “unlimited” service.

The 3G data cap across Orange’s iPhone pay monthly tariffs is 750MB per month. That’s plenty of breathing space to scour websites and send e-mails, but for streaming media services, it’s not so generous. Spotify streams songs at 160kbps on mobile and will hit that 750MB cut off point at about 13 hours of sonic slinging. That’s just around 25 minutes a day – around eight 3 minute tracks and well under one album.

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Needless to say, video streaming apps and websites with embedded video will chomp through data even quicker.

Orange’s iPhone terms and conditions actually prohibit “non-Orange internet based streaming services…and internet based video,” although we’ve checked with the network and it says this won’t be enforced: “We recognise that iPhone customers will use popular streaming services such as YouTube, Spotify etc. As a result we do not intend to apply network protection controls, as long as customers remain within their usage allowance,” an Orange spokesperson told us.

That still leaves a cap of 750MB hanging over your head though. We’re pained to say it, but Orange’s iPhone deals are looking less and less competitive.

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