Carrier Verizon - 3G and 1x speeds

I have Verizon and an iPhone 5s - for about 5 mins of my daily drive in a small town called Vacaville I switch to 3G and the speeds are slow- like 1.5 mbs but it's 5 mins out of a 45 min drive otherwise I am on LTE 99% of the time with Verizon - I travel regularly to Reno, Vegas and Atlanta without issues

When my VZW service drops down to 3g, I get about 2.00 Mbps download and .9 Mbps upload. I'd not even consider using data at 1x, its too slow.

Compare that with my 23Mbs/10MBps LTE speeds, the 3G is much slower but its workable.

Surprisingly Verizon 3G is good, when I drop down to 3g (which is hardly ever) it works extremely well and Im coming from Sprint 3G which is the same technology as Verizons 3G but Verizon does a much better job at throughput and capacity. I see speeds of 1.5 -2 megs down and about half a meg up. Defa workable connection, not optimal but it works for everything including streaming.

You probably will drop to 3G speeds, if anything. Finding 1X is pretty rare.
The speeds I've gotten range from 0.5 to 1.9 Mbps. Even at 0.5 Mbps, it is still extremely usable (streaming video and audio work though not as great as LTE).

Attached is a speedtest result. LTE vs 3G vs WIFI.

Seeing as VZW has the largest LTE network by far, you won't be on EVDO often.

AutoUnion39 said:

Seeing as VZW has the largest LTE network by far, you won't be on EVDO often.

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No, that's not entirely true. I have very good LTE strength here in Boston and it drops down to 3G from time to time. Besides the OP is asking about 3G speeds not about how extensive the LTE coverage is.

my 1x speed might as well not even be data.

maflynn said:

No, that's not entirely true. I have very good LTE strength here in Boston and it drops down to 3G from time to time. Besides the OP is asking about 3G speeds not about how extensive the LTE coverage is.

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I'm also in Boston and you do bring up a valid point. I do see EVDO once in a while on VZW.

Depending on the area, 3G may perform better than LTE as the LTE network is overloaded in a lot of places.

JoshGlzBrk said:

Depending on the area, 3G may perform better than LTE as the LTE network is overloaded in a lot of places.

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Doubtful, my buddy on VZ pulls at least 10 during peak hours on LTE and less than 0.5 Mbps on EVDO on a good day.

DCIFRTHS said:

What area is he located in?

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Outside of Milwaukee

carjakester said:

my 1x speed might as well not even be data.

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Well it's basically not data

The last time I got 1x or "O" (iOS 6 and earlier) was when I was in the middle of nowhere. Most of the time I had LTE and for maybe 10% of the time I had 3G. VZWs 3G is fairly fast. Outside, I can pull 2Mbps both ways, but a more realistic speed would be around 1-1.5Mbps both ways.

My LTE is just as good inside as it is out. However, it is slower depending on the age of the building your in. A newer building should have little to no signal drop. Meanwhile, an older building might experiance a dropped bar or 2, switching from LTE to 3G or just slower LTE speeds.

Regarding the indicators, iOS 7 forward identifies VZWs network with LTE, 3G, and 1x. Before iOS 7, 1x was "O".

Worth noting that the 1x network is mainly for calls only. It can do data, but it is DOG SLOW. I'm talking dial-up slow.

Also worth noting that unless you are hugging a cell site, having LTE on will drop the signal 1 bar. Where I am I usually get 4 bars if I switch LTE off. But having LTE on lowers the amount of bars to 3. Meanwhile, if I'm in a store with a cell tower on the property, I can get 5 bars and LTE no problem. Travel 1/4-1/2 mile down the road and one bar drops.

bkends35 said:

Doubtful, my buddy on VZ pulls at least 10 during peak hours on LTE and less than 0.5 Mbps on EVDO on a good day.

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Verizon is piss poor around the Seattle area during the day and is almost unusable to the point of having to switch to 3G to get anything to load. I believe the CEO even admitted they messed up by letting the network get so bad in some areas.

Verizon - 3G and 1x speeds

It depends on your area. I have Verizon and currently live a work just north of Baltimore. Data speeds on 3G are rarely above 1 mb. 1x is pretty much useless for more then iMessage.

My 3G in a brick buildings basement which with sprint I had no coverage.

DCIFRTHS said:

Even though I prioritize call quality over data, the slow 1x speed is what concerns me about moving to Verizon.

Interesting... I wonder if the LTE signal is less robust than CDMA (1x or EVDO)?

Do you know if LTE, in your area, is on the same frequency as the CDMA signal? From what I have read, Verizon uses mainly 700 MHz bands for the main network, and some AWS bands for supplemental LTE coverage. I know they have deployed it in the city, but I'm not sure of they have done so for my area - Westchester, NY.

What area are you located in?

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I wouldn't worry about 1x unless your visiting the boonies. I'm outside (not "just outside", but outside) of Los Angeles and I always get awesome signal.

Regarding the frequency, I'm not exactly sure what band we operate on. Even if I head into LA it still does the same thing. The speed stays the same and once the LTE connection is dropped when making a phone call, the signal goes back up (or down depending on far away you are from the cell site).

iamMacPerson said:

I wouldn't worry about 1x unless your visiting the boonies. I'm outside (not "just outside", but outside) of Los Angeles and I always get awesome signal.



Regarding the frequency, I'm not exactly sure what band we operate on. Even if I head into LA it still does the same thing. The speed stays the same and once the LTE connection is dropped when making a phone call, the signal goes back up (or down depending on far away you are from the cell site).

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I agree and disagree about 1x. As a Verizon 4S owner I see it more often then I'd like.

That said, I kind of agree because the majority of the time you'll be on LTE, then 3G and finally 1x. Unfortunately I don't have the luxury of LTE.

And I'm not positive about this but I also notice 1x when I'm in a building/basement so maybe the penetration of 1x is better then Verizon's 3G.

cynics said:

I agree and disagree about 1x. As a Verizon 4S owner I see it more often then I'd like.

That said, I kind of agree because the majority of the time you'll be on LTE, then 3G and finally 1x. Unfortunately I don't have the luxury of LTE.

And I'm not positive about this but I also notice 1x when I'm in a building/basement so maybe the penetration of 1x is better then Verizon's 3G.

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Yeah I didn't think of that. 1x does go further. I didn't think about that since we don't have basements in SoCal.