If you can, buy direct from Apple, the Trade in value is much less then what Verizon Offers on the phones, but both option 1 and 2 will lock you in for 36 months, which means the credit for $1000 or $730 will be spread out over 36 months. Which also means you have to maintain the same plan for next 36 months, you can upgrade to higher tier plan but cannot downgrade to lower Tier plan, or else you will be responsible for the remaining balance on the phone. Good luck with your Phone hunting. More on reddit.com

Might depend on your situation and amount of lines, but for our plan we found out we can actually save money by upgrading our plan. We have an older "do more unlimited" and plan to switch to "unlimited plus" which are nearly identical aside from Verizon Cloud stuff which we don't even use and few other smaller details. I'd recommend just going into a corporate store, not an authorized retailer, and asking them to print some quotes off for you. Also make sure they don't include any extras like the 5.99 per device for verizon cloud, or any streaming subscriptions you dont want. It will break it down pretty clearly for what you pay currently, and what you will be paying in the future. They have a $830 trade in credit promo currently which I got added to a quote, for a 16 pro it only added ~$5 a month, while changing plans can save us ~$30. From what they said, any device in pretty much any condition is accepted, as long as it turns on and doesnt have a puffy or leaking battery. If you dont plan to upgrade in the next 3 years it might be worth it, otherwise I'd still look into changing to a newer plan and buying your own device. From what I gathered most of the savings is that the newer plans have higher autopay discounts More on reddit.com

The promo credit depends on the plan you pick. If you go with Ultimate without a trade in on a new line they give you the Pro Max “ON US”. If you Trade in they give you $1000 off. So no trade in is better if you’re doing a new line of service on the Ultimate plan. If you’re an existing customer and wanting to do an Upgrade then the trade in deals will depend on the plan level you choose. More on reddit.com

The current trade in deal for existing customers is $1000 off. You also qualify for the watch and iPad deal. More on reddit.com