How Many Frequency Bands Does My Cell Phone Need To Get Service

Understanding what phone band terms mean

Some newer devices are considered dual-band phones and can run on both technologies. If you lot're looking to hop from one carrier to another and want to bring your current phone with you, you don't need to wade through product specs to see if it'southward compatible. To see if you tin transfer a specific device from some other carrier to the Verizon Wireless network, click here.

Both CDMA and GSM are multiple-admission technologies, meaning they allow multiple calls or data connections on ane radio channel. GSM transforms calls into digital information, gives them a shared aqueduct and a time slot and puts the pieces of each recall together for the listener on the other end. CDMA encodes each phone call'due south data with a unique key. Then all calls are transmitted at one time, with receivers "dividing" the combined signal dorsum into individual calls.

Of the two, GSM is more widely used around the globe, with availability in more than 200 countries. While CDMA is used widely in the U.S., it is less mutual elsewhere — most estimates pin the portion of global wireless networks using CDMA at less than twenty percentage. The Verizon network is a CDMA wireless network.

What does the CDMA/GSM difference mean?

One major distinction between GSM networks and CDMA networks is that the former allows you to make vocalization calls and transmit information at the same time, while the latter does not. Simply there'due south a take hold of.

How a phone band affects your phone choice

GSM and CDMA standards employ to 2G and 3G connectivity. Carriers all began switching to LTE in 2010, and LTE does support simultaneous vocalisation and data use. Moreover, because LTE is a global standard for 4G networks, Verizon and all other carriers have fabricated the switch, regardless of whether their 2G and 3G connectivity was supported past GSM or CDMA networks.

The distinction is becoming less of import and will be entirely irrelevant sooner rather than after (more on that below). At the moment, still, 2G and 3G networks continue to serve every bit a backup for areas where 4G LTE coverage is weak. And, until recently, many phones used LTE for data only and relied on GSM or CDMA for voice and texts.

For day-to-solar day utilize, the distinction between GSM and CDMA is not likely to be a big issue. Today'due south CDMA phones work on GSM networks, which is why y'all're able to use your Verizon phone when traveling to places that rely on GSM, such as Europe and Asia.

The future of CDMA vs. GSM.

As carriers build out 5G networks, they're decommissioning their 2G and 3G infrastructure. Different carriers have different timelines for this, but Verizon is taking concrete steps to brainstorm transitioning CDMA devices off of the network at the terminate of 2019 — somewhen moving all devices to the Hd Voice LTE network.

This has implications for people with older phones who want to switch carriers. Starting on December 31, 2019, customers will no longer be able to move a 3G/4G non-Hard disk Voice CDMA device from 1 business relationship to another. They will also no longer exist able to provide such a device to activate on an existing line or swap one such device for some other. However, customers with these devices will all the same exist able to suspend and resume service, change their phone number, upgrade to uniform 4G or 5G devices and activate new lines for 4G or 5G devices.

On December 31, 2020, Verizon will brainstorm moving all devices to the HD Vocalisation LTE network. While the CDMA network will remain bachelor as-is until that date, any service requests related to CDMA devices may receive limited support after the cease of 2019. Customers are encouraged to upgrade to newer technology.

Both CDMA and GSM networks accept provided millions of callers with crucial connectivity over a number of years. Watch for these technologies to exist gradually phased out and for connectivity to improve.

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