Millions of O2 and Virgin Mobile customers will be hit with price hikes in April this year the mobile providers' parent company has confirmed.

Price hikes could be as high as 17.3% in certain cases, according to MoneySavingExpert.

They said: "If you're on an O2 'Refresh' or Virgin Mobile 'Freestyle' plan, the headline figure of 17.3% will apply to the airtime part of your contract only, so what you pay for calls, texts and data, not what you pay for any device you have.

"Virgin Media O2, the parent company of both firms, says this means the average price rise across all its mobile customers is 10% – which is just below inflation."

Midweek Herald: Many mobile providers are hiking their prices around the springtimeMany mobile providers are hiking their prices around the springtime (Image: PA)

How much will O2 and Virgin Mobile contracts rise by in April 2023?

O2 and Virgin use the January retail prices index (RPI) rate of inflation as part of their price rise calculation, which is 13.4%.

For O2 Pay-monthly and Sim-only users with mobiles, tablets and/or smart watches who took out a deal or upgraded from 25 March 2021 the rise will be January's RPI figure plus 3.9 percentage points.

Those Pay-monthly and Sim-only users with mobiles, tablets and/or smart watches who took out a deal or upgraded before 25 March 2021 will see a rise of 13.4%.

Meanwhile, pay-as-you-go users will see no change in their costs.

For Virgin Mobile all pay-monthly and Sim-only users, the rise will be January's RPI figure plus 3.9 percentage points.

As a separate note, Virgin Mobile users will be migrated to O2 later this year and will be subject to O2's price change formula from 2024.

If you're outside your minimum contract term with either O2 or Virgin Mobile you will be able to leave without incurring an extra cost.

However, if you actively signed up for a new tariff within the last year or two then these price rises will be written into that contract which means you won't be able to cancel penalty-free.

O2 and Virgin Mobile are not the only companies to implement price rises as BT, EE and Sky have already announced price rises of up to 14.4% for their mobile customers from around the same time.

Ofcom is set to investigate the practice of mid-contract price hikes, as there is a worry customers aren't being fully informed of what they could end up paying over the course of the deal.