T-Mobile Expanding 3G Network

By Geoff Duncan September 19, 2008

T-Mobile Expanding 3G Network

Although it still hasn’t been officially announced, U.S. mobile operator T-Mobile is widely expected to introduce the first mobile phone build on Google’s Android platform next month, in the form of the HTC Dream. The potential problem with this scenario is that, while the Dream supports 3G data connectivity, T-Mobile is the number four mobile operator and only has 3G service up in a handful of markets. T-Mobile introduced 3G service in New York City in May and has since extended service to a handful of other markets, including Miami, Houston, Boston, San Diego, and Las Vegas.

Now, reports have T-Mobile extending 3G services to a total of 27 markets by the end of 2008, with major cities like Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, San Francisco, and Seattle set to come online by the end of October. Additional rollout are expected for Denver, Detroit, Tampa, Kansas City, and other markets by the end of the year. If the rollouts go as expected, T-Mobile will be able to offer 3G service to about two-thirds of its customer base by the end of the year.

Expanded 3G coverage may help T-Mobile persuade some customers to try out the HTC Dream—or other smartphone offerings—on their network, but even AT&T has been the target of criticism for availability of 3G service for use with the popular iPhone 3G…and it already has a 3G footprint significantly larger than what T-Mobile seemingly plans to offer by the end of the year.

Editors' Recommendations

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Geoff Duncan writes, programs, edits, plays music, and delights in making software misbehave. He's probably the only member…

Mobile

It’s late 2022, and Verizon and AT&T still can’t beat T-Mobile’s 5G network

It’s been 10 months since Verizon and AT&T flipped the switch on their new C-band 5G spectrum, but it appears both carriers still have their work cut out for them if they want to catch up to T-Mobile.

Market analyses and independent tests have agreed for years that T-Mobile is the fastest and most reliable 5G carrier in the U.S. That’s not surprising as it had a massive advantage by holding licenses for the crucial midrange spectrum that provides the best balance between range and speed. While Verizon’s early high-frequency mmWave rollouts allowed it to boast raw speeds that were significantly faster, those were confined to about 1% of its subscriber base.

Mobile

T-Mobile’s 5G Ultra Capacity network has four times the coverage of Verizon and AT&T

T-Mobile smartphone.

Last week, a report from Ookla revealed that T-Mobile's 5G and 4G LTE networks are nearly twice as fast as those of Verizon and AT&T. Today, Opensignal released the results of a new study that reveals one of the most significant reasons for T-Mobile's lead.

5G services cover a much wider range of frequencies than older cellular technologies, each with unique advantages and disadvantages. Since low-band 5G frequencies have considerably more range than higher frequencies and generally share the same airwaves as 4G/LTE services, all three carriers have leveraged this spectrum to provide their extended nationwide coverage. T-Mobile calls this its 5G Extended Range network, Verizon uses the term 5G Nationwide, and AT&T just calls it 5G.

Mobile

T-Mobile’s 5G and 4G LTE networks are nearly twice as fast as Verizon and AT&T

Ookla's second-quarter market report has just gone live, revealing that T-Mobile still has a commanding lead over rivals Verizon and AT&T when it comes to offering the fastest and most consistent speeds throughout the U.S.

T-Mobile took the top spot for performance on both its 5G and 4G/LTE networks, with median download speeds of 187.33Mbps on 5G and 116.54Mbps across the board. Overall, that's nearly twice as fast as Verizon and AT&T, which clocked in at 59.67Mbps and 54.64Mbps, respectively. The Un-carrier also delivered the most consistent speeds of the bunch, with 85.7% of tests showing at least 5Mpbs download and 1Mbps upload speeds.