AT&T and Verizon - shutting down 3G service

[WSUCoug1994]

AT&T said they will shut their 3G service in 2022 and Verizon will do it at the end of this year. 

I wonder if that will impact some of the people around here with their older phones or people in more remote locations.  Just wanted to let people know. 

[HipGnosis]

AT&T said they will shut their 3G service in 2022 and Verizon will do it at the end of this year. 

I wonder if that will impact some of the people around here with their older phones or people in more remote locations.  Just wanted to let people know.

Yep. I've got my old, landline # ported to PagePlus ($10/3 mo) on Verizon on an old, 3G cellphone.

[DeepEllumStache]

The Verizon timeline sounded a bit aggressive for the telecom industry. Turns out Verizon isn’t shutting down the network in 2019, they are just stating that they’ll no longer sell new devices on 3G. The actual shut down is TBD, which likely means years into the future. Your 3G phones are fine in the near term but I wouldn’t recommend replacing any phone with a 3G version.

When they shut down 2G, most telecoms offered some good deals on cheaper phones to lure the remaining customers over to 3G or LTE networks. For those that didn’t want to get a new phone, there were still a few 2G options (T-Mobile in particular offered deals aimed to IoT customers since those were the majority of customers still in 2G).

[WSUCoug1994]

That actually makes sense - sounded aggressive.  The link you included goes to a sign-in page for Verizon.

This is what I read on the WSJ this morning - I think I misinterpreted it.

AT&T Inc. T -0.10% said it plans to stop serving devices that use third-generation wireless technology in early 2022 as it makes room for more powerful standards. The decision, disclosed in a Wednesday regulatory filing, comes after rival Verizon Communications Inc. VZ +0.72% warned consumers it will stop serving 3G cellphones at the end of this year.

[DeepEllumStache]

You’re right. Wow... Verizon is targeting shutting down 3G by Dec 31 this year. But they did delay the “no more activating” deadline by 6 months, so it’s possible that the shut down deadline could slip.

In theory, since Verizon and Sprint both use CDMA (AT&T and T-Mobile are GSM), 3G phones should work on Sprint or MVNO networks over Sprint. But if Sprint gets acquired by T-Mobile, that could leave CDMA 3G in the dust in terms of maintaining it.

Maybe they want to get it in before the next election in case there is a political regime change. Politically interesting since Verizon typically has stronger rural coverage versus a more urban carrier like T-Mobile. It’s still flying under the mass media radar more than I would have expected. The 2G shut down had a pretty large outcry and it was mostly an IoT issue since few mobile consumers were left.

[SpareChange]

You’re right. Wow... Verizon is targeting shutting down 3G by Dec 31 this year. But they did delay the “no more activating” deadline by 6 months, so it’s possible that the shut down deadline could slip.

In theory, since Verizon and Sprint both use CDMA (AT&T and T-Mobile are GSM), 3G phones should work on Sprint or MVNO networks over Sprint. But if Sprint gets acquired by T-Mobile, that could leave CDMA 3G in the dust in terms of maintaining it.

Maybe they want to get it in before the next election in case there is a political regime change. Politically interesting since Verizon typically has stronger rural coverage versus a more urban carrier like T-Mobile. It’s still flying under the mass media radar more than I would have expected. The 2G shut down had a pretty large outcry and it was mostly an IoT issue since few mobile consumers were left.

I think they announced the 12-31-19 date back in 2016ish. They will keep a small sliver of 3G going for some m2m enterprise customers i believe until end of 2022.

[DeepEllumStache]

The telecoms took 5 years between announcing the closure of 2g and actually closing it down. And by then 2g was a technology grandparent. Very few consumer 2g phones were around by that point. It was a "wait that still exists?" type move. There are still enough customers on 3g (and especially if you consider the lack of rural coverage) to make this feel fast.

As of mid last year, they were saying 90% of traffic was on LTE. 10% doesn't sound like that much but it's the 80/20 rule in action. 20% of your effort yields 80% of your results. Conversely and much more painfully, the last 20% of your results require 80% of your efforts. The last 10% are the holdouts, the ones that don't want to change. Unless Verizon plans on granting a lot of waivers or are happy with losing that revenue, that's a very aggressive deadline.

[kenmoremmm]

as someone that doesn't pay attention to phones, if i have a flip phone c.2005, and it has no internet and is on a $5/mo text and calls plan, am i on 3G?

[DeepEllumStache]

4g launched around December 2010 (and typically mass market phone adoption occurs within the next year or so after that launch), so at best your phone is running on 3g.

[BTDretire]

I don't know what it all means but my city is one of the 5 cities to get 5G with Verizon.
The infra structure was so badly damaged that rather than repair it they decided to
just go with to latest upgrade. Hopefully sometime this year.
  I did get 3 free months of not so good service after the hurricane.

https://www.smartcitiesdive.com/news/verizon-panama-city-florida-5g-rollout-hurricane-michael/540657/

[DeepEllumStache]

Tanslation: we don't want to spend hundreds of millions of dollars replacing the 3g infrastructure here that we're turning off in a year, so we'll throw you just enough deals to maintain you as a customer and hope you stay until the new standard works out its kinks

[Mike in NH]

Leave it to the evil empire to figure out how to force consumerism on people. I love the crap I get from friends and co-workers for having an iPhone 4s. Whenever someone asks me why I don't get a new phone my favorite line is 'I can't afford it.'

For those who are tech savvy, what are the actual implications of the network going away, would a phone that runs on 3G still be able to make calls and send texts? Or will my phone basically just become an outdated camera when it isn't on wifi?

More concerned about my father, I'm envisioning him in the verizon store dropping eff bombs and telling them they can pull his flip phone from his cold dead hands haha. 

[markbike528CBX]

as someone that doesn't pay attention to phones, if i have a flip phone c.2005, and it has no internet and is on a $5/mo text and calls plan, am i on 3G?

The original iPhone was launched in 2007 as a 2.75G EGDE device, so that had me thinking along those lines, but if it still works, it must be 3G.  AFAIK, all 2G networks have been shut down.

[SpareChange]

The telecoms took 5 years between announcing the closure of 2g and actually closing it down. And by then 2g was a technology grandparent. Very few consumer 2g phones were around by that point. It was a "wait that still exists?" type move. There are still enough customers on 3g (and especially if you consider the lack of rural coverage) to make this feel fast.

As of mid last year, they were saying 90% of traffic was on LTE. 10% doesn't sound like that much but it's the 80/20 rule in action. 20% of your effort yields 80% of your results. Conversely and much more painfully, the last 20% of your results require 80% of your efforts. The last 10% are the holdouts, the ones that don't want to change. Unless Verizon plans on granting a lot of waivers or are happy with losing that revenue, that's a very aggressive deadline.

I do have questions about rural coverage, having experienced my phone dropping to 3g in my parents house or down nearby country roads. That said, I don't they've moved particularly fast at all. I was a little surprised they didn't move faster. They've been lazily tossing out that 90% number for awhile now. They passed that back in the 4Q of 2015 I believe.

[fattest_foot]

I do have questions about rural coverage, having experienced my phone dropping to 3g in my parents house or down nearby country roads. That said, I don't they've moved particularly fast at all. I was a little surprised they didn't move faster. They've been lazily tossing out that 90% number for awhile now. They passed that back in the 4Q of 2015 I believe.

This is my concern too. I'd say pretty often in California we go places where it drops down to 3g or 1x. Do all those 3g areas just drop down to basic cell service?

If so, that sounds like a massive cut in actual service.

[markbike528CBX]

FWIW, I was driving down highway 36 (East Central Colorado, Most of the way through Kansas) and got NO reception on ATT.

Admittedly, I had and iPhone 3GS  and my wife had a supercheeeeep Samsung.  So I was on 3G**, A&TT.  I saw a lot (well for Kansas anyway) of adds for other cellphone providers. 


**https://everymac.com/systems/apple/iphone/specs/apple-iphone-3g-s-specs.html
Cell Network:   2G/3G*. *The iPhone 3GS supports both 3G (UMTS/HSDPA -- 850, 1900, 2100 MHz - 7.2 Mbps) and GSM/EDGE (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz) networks

[nemesis]

Leave it to the evil empire to figure out how to force consumerism on people. I love the crap I get from friends and co-workers for having an iPhone 4s. Whenever someone asks me why I don't get a new phone my favorite line is 'I can't afford it.'

For those who are tech savvy, what are the actual implications of the network going away, would a phone that runs on 3G still be able to make calls and send texts? Or will my phone basically just become an outdated camera when it isn't on wifi?

More concerned about my father, I'm envisioning him in the verizon store dropping eff bombs and telling them they can pull his flip phone from his cold dead hands haha.

Meh...phones are so cheap, technology changes...imho not a big deal at all.

The only thing I had to do was switch my home security system to 4G to make sure it still provided cellular coverage.

A phone that is 3G only won't be able to make calls or send texts.  Just buy a cheap 4G phone (less than $30 sometimes) and it will work fine.

Your old device will work fine on wifi, so use it as an iPod or small home internet device.