T-Mobile and Verizon Are Basically Tied in Network Speeds and So-Called 'Availability'

[swissmann]

I was shocked to see that my Tmobile phone had much better coverage than my Mother in Laws Verizon phone at a local reservoir this last summer. Verizon had always won in locations like this when I checked but now it seems they each have their strong spots. Keep it up Tmobile. I'm getting a lot for $20 per month per line (Family, 2 GB data, unlimited call, unlimited text).

 

[MarkNY]

I'll give T-mobile a bit more time to turn on the extended range LTE in my area or I'm gone. LTE is basically unusable indoors.

 

[ryanwarsaw]

What is it with comments like "You should come out east or to Iowa."? If you are going to make such statements at least say what company you feel is better in that region. I don't actually want to have to fly out east to find out for myself.

 

[jcmeyer5]

Haha! Look at all the Verizon customers crying and complaining! Maybe TM isn't as good yet, but it's clear they are catching up. They also offer hard to beat deals. Not sure why anyone would be mad at that.

Because they gain subscribers through lies, manipulations, and empty promises? That Binge-On program would be awesome... if you can get ACTUAL coverage. I tried TMO a while back. I couldn't get signal in their store, and 2 bars right outside their store. They thrive on being the "hip" thing to do.

 

[macTW]

I like how this isn't based on population density and only on statistical averages. Having fast and reliable coverage amidst millions of people is different than in the hills by yourself.

 

[jcmeyer5]

What is it with comments like "You should come out east or to Iowa."? If you are going to make such statements at least say what company you feel is better in that region. I don't actually want to have to fly out east to find out for myself.

In Northern Indiana, it is AT&T for continuous coverage.

 

[ryanwarsaw]

In Northern Indiana, it is AT&T for continuous coverage.

I wasn't directing that at you specifically. Boy if you only knew what it was like in California.

 

[colonels1020]

I don't know about Verizon but the T Mobile coverage isn't great outside of cities.

They've gotten a LOT better, even just during this past year. Their Band12 rollout has helped tremendously in rural areas. Recently visited a little town in middle GA where I would either get EDGE or No Service, but now had Band12 with pretty decent download speeds. They're definitely making progress one day at a time.

 

[imlynxy]

I switched Att to T-mobile because I needed international roaming. T-mobile sucks compare to Att here in Boston. Neville(T-mobile's CTO) just twitted that they were fastest during Patriots parade. BS or may be COWs. Data speeds are congested in a lot of spots in Boston. In some areas I still have less than 1mbps.
Just drove 93 north NH, no service almost everywhere past Campton NH. even if it shows roaming partner on the map. I only got my t-mobile signal back in Littleton NH.

But: T-mobile works for me, better to say in my case. 1. I have unlimited Att hotspot in my car. 2. International roaming is the most important feature for me. 3. I pay less, a lot more less. 4. I very rare travel outside of major areas.

P.S. My best friend switched during 2 free lines black Fridaypromo. He had 4 UDP VZW lines , but wanted save some money. I told him many times to measure the possible outcomes. He was overexcited since his over friend is T-mo fanatic and a shareholder ( not like everybody with 1 share) . Now: His son has no coverage at school, His data speed at work 0.25-0.5. He traded iphones and they never got them. He has no credit for "free" lines. He sent an email to John a week ago and still has no answer. .... and he "blames" me that I didn't stop him .

 

[ryanwarsaw]

They've gotten a LOT better, even just during this past year. Their Band12 rollout has helped tremendously in rural areas. Recently visited a little town in middle GA where I would either get EDGE or No Service, but now had Band12 with pretty decent download speeds. They're definitely making progress one day at a time.

Edge only?!?! The humanity!!!! Some places in the world you are lucky to get even that. It is enough to run Google maps and navigate out of such backwaters to your nearest Starbucks. I know connecting to wifi is a complete hassle but we all do what we have to right?

I am joking and feel your pain. T-Mobile would drop out on and off along the freeway in northern Minnesota sometimes.

 

[precogincog]

In cities is one thing. I can't speak to that. It's the roads and interstates where the difference is clear. Verizon wins interstates and rural areas, for now.

.. or on hills, or in buildings, or behind buildings, etc. When there is no coverage at my suburban house and you have no plans to fix it you have a problem.

 

[mithion]

Yep, Band 12 has made tmobile 10times better.

It's better but still not as good as Verizon's. Nowadays, instead of getting 3 bars of Edge network indoors, I get 1 bar of LTE. Even if LTE is much faster than Edge, one bar gets you nowhere. I'm really disappointed with band 12 so far. Verizon's band 13 seemed so much stronger.

 

[ryanwarsaw]

.. or on hills, or in buildings, or behind buildings, etc. When there is no coverage at my suburban house and you have no plans to fix it you have a problem.

... or in Europe or in Thailand or anywhere their (Verizon) standard isn't compatible. That from what I can tell is Verizon's fatal flaw. It doesn't work in the majority of the world. Is this a reason Verizon coverage is accepted as better than most other carriers? Does their signal transmit farther because of the frequency they use? If so I may be convinced to buy a phone for USA use only.

 

[magicman32]

Lame excuse.

GPS, streaming music, and phone calls require good coverage. Something TMo does not have.

Good coverage "where you live and travel." Had to fix that for you.

Their coverage where I live and travel is second to none and I'd be a fool to pay anyone else for cell service considering what I get on T-Mo. NY, NJ, Philly... as rock solid as anyone.

Doesn't work for you, that's fine. Hardly true for the everyone despite your protestations to the contrary.

I know for years you've been the resident T-Mo troll and malcontent, but your misleading alternative facts like the one above don't do you any favors.

 

[truthertech]

I'm a Verizon customer and teetering on the edge of switching to TM because of Verizon's pricing. To me the verdict is still out, but I suspect from reading these comments that there is a lot of repeating old memes about Verizon being so much better outside of cities than TM.

TM clearly has come a long way since it was limited to major metro areas. Look at the leading independent company's, Root Metrics, map of coverage in the three key areas of call performance, speed and best technology, for each of the four main providers. Here's some objective data. This is pretty revealing.

http://webcoveragemap.rootmetrics.com/en-US

Here's their reports for the major and medium size metro areas as well.

http://www.rootmetrics.com/en-US/rootscore/map

 

[treyjustice]

No... just no.

Visit Northern Arizona and you will see why Verizon is better.

I guess it really depends where you travel. I am in DFW texas and tmobile is awesome. Also unlimited data. I haven't had much problems when travelling, I don't travel often though. I would love to use verizon though, if the prices were competitive and they offered unlimited data.

 

[imlynxy]

They've gotten a LOT better, even just during this past year. Their Band12 rollout has helped tremendously in rural areas. Recently visited a little town in middle GA where I would either get EDGE or No Service, but now had Band12 with pretty decent download speeds. They're definitely making progress one day at a time.

They got better in terms of coverage and network quality, I agree. Not VZW coverage, but they improved more than any other company. But they getting worse in term of billing and CS.

 

[itr81]

Recently switch from AT&T to TM and so far couldn't be happier! Better data and coverage. Typical I use wifi calling whenever I'm indoors.

 

[magicman32]

Because they gain subscribers through lies, manipulations, and empty promises? That Binge-On program would be awesome... if you can get ACTUAL coverage. I tried TMO a while back. I couldn't get signal in their store, and 2 bars right outside their store. They thrive on being the "hip" thing to do.

M

Because they gain subscribers through lies, manipulations, and empty promises? That Binge-On program would be awesome... if you can get ACTUAL coverage. I tried TMO a while back. I couldn't get signal in their store, and 2 bars right outside their store. They thrive on being the "hip" thing to do.

If any of that was true they wouldn't keep said customers. Manipulations, lies and empty promises? Hardly.

Binge on program is amazing for me. I get spectacular coverage. You don't. So where are we? Oh yeah, the usual. YMMV. You seem overly bitter about it for some reason.

 

[Plutonius]

I'm a Verizon customer and teetering on the edge of switching to TM because of Verizon's pricing. To me the verdict is still out, but I suspect from reading these comments that there is a lot of repeating old memes about Verizon being so much better outside of cities than TM.

TM clearly has come a long way since it was limited to major metro areas. Look at the leading independent company's, Root Metrics, map of coverage in the three key areas of call performance, speed and best technology, for each of the four main providers. Here's some objective data. This is pretty revealing.

http://webcoveragemap.rootmetrics.com/en-US

Here's their reports for the major and medium size metro areas as well.

http://www.rootmetrics.com/en-US/rootscore/map

If you believe it then switch. What people have been posting is their actual experience outside of cities. Coverage maps for all the providers are misleading.

 

[macduke]

I'm not sure why this continues to be a common misconception. You aren't throttled after 28GB. Instead, you're deprioritized. Assuming you aren't in an area that's already overly congested, chances are that your speeds won't be any slower than before you hit 28GB.

That's just sugar coating it. Their big disclaimer right on their homepage mentions it:

On all T-Mobile plans, during congestion the top 3% of data users (>28GB/mo.) may notice reduced speeds until next bill cycle due to data prioritization

Reduced speeds = throttling. Most people live near large cities, and I'd speculate most T-Mobile users live near large cities as their service elsewhere is shaky. So it seems reasonable to say that you'll be throttled.

 

[iamMacPerson]

My father works for a trucking company and has had all three major carriers. There is a reason he switched back to Verizon after dealing with AT&T for years: the coverage isn't that great when you're not in the city or off a major highway. T-Mobile was even worse. As soon as he left the metro area, that was it. And if you walked into a building, dead zone. T-MO's network is a joke.

For me personally, Verizon proved invaluable when I got a call from work on my way to LA saying I needed to read and sign some documents. I was in the middle of the desert, I'd say 90 miles or so west of Phoenix, and I pulled out my laptop and turned on Instant Hotspot. I had a stable LTE connection at 3Mbps. While not amazingly fast, we're talking about the middle of no where. It wasn't even a town I pulled in to, but a rest stop. I couldn't see a tower nearby and I still had 2 bars.

Out of curiosity I had my staunch T-MO supporting friend pull out their iPhone and try to run a speed test. Top left corner: 'No Service'.

 

[truthertech]

If you believe it then switch. What people have been posting is their actual experience outside of cities. Coverage maps for all the providers are misleading.

Believe what? You have to read the thread more carefully. People's posts have been all over the board with their anecdotal reports.

 

[Bob Sanders]

I doubt Verizon has it's latest 4G LTE service in rural areas. It's likely legacy 2G or maybe 3G service there. They are also a business and I'm sure they deploy their resources strategically as well to get the best bang for the buck.

We all have doubts about something, but I have no doubt that you just made this up.

About a year ago I drove from Iowa to LA and back via Nebraska, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Missouri with a Verizon iPad on my dash for navigation. As I expected there were areas in the mountains where I didn't have any data coverage, but for the most part I was on LTE. Never once did I have a working 3G connection and no LTE.

Verizon's strategy is to deploy LTE in as many places as possible and because of that, they have LTE coverage over a vast majority of the lower 48 including rural areas. They are in the middle of their LTE Advanced rollout, and that is coming to their entire network as well. No other carrier is close to Verizon in national LTE coverage, despite the deceptive numbers they(Sprint, T-Mobile) use in their ads.

There are individual areas of the country that other carriers are better than Verizon, but no one touches them overall. For the most part this is simply because Verizon does not own enough bandwidth in that area. That is the biggest hurdle to overcome when expanding, and that is why other carriers aren't really catching up to Verizon on a nationwide level.

 

[Plutonius]

Believe what? You have to read the thread more carefully. People's posts have been all over the board with their anecdotal reports.

Agreed but if you read threads on Verizon and ATT, you get much more of a consensus. I like T-Mobile but, from personal experience, the rural coverage makes it unusable for me (I had to switch last year from T-Mobile to ATT).