What about 4G in phones?

And here lies our problem with some of the current phones on the market by AT&T and T-Mobile, which have that overused 4G moniker added to their names. A quick look at the spec sheets of some of those devices shows that they only offer peak download speeds of 14.4 Mbit/s, and upload speeds of 5.76 Mbit/s. Examples for such phones on AT&T are the LG Thrill 4G, Motorola ATRIX 4G, HTC Inspire 4G, HP Veer 4G... while on T-Mobile, such handsets are the HTC Sensation 4G and myTouch 4G. So, even though these handsets do not meet the performance requirements outlined in the official HSPA+ standard, AT&T and T-Mobile have decided to call them “4G”, which is obviously misleading, to say the least.

Recently, we've begun to see phones with the radios that are capable enough to be called 4G, or at least when it comes to download. T-Mobile's myTouch 4G Slide, Samsung Exhibit 4G, Sidekick 4G and Galaxy S 4G are good examples of that. All of these handsets deliver theoretical peak download speeds of 21 Mbit/s, which can be safely considered true HSPA+ connectivity. Well, when it comes to the uplink, those handsets still max out at 5.76 Mbit/s, which is well below the possible 11.5 Mbit/s for HSPA+, so from that point of view, these devices are still semi-4G. But considering that download is more important than upload to most users, let's say that we can live with this.

The Exhibit 4G and Galaxy S 4G are examples of true 4G HSPA+ phones, at least in terms of download speeds

We inquired T-Mobile, in order to see what their position is with regards to why they are calling those HSPA 14.4 Mbit/s phones “4G”. T-Mobile's explanation was that they think of those devices as 4G, because even if they do not comply to the requirements for peak HSPA+ speeds, they still offer improved latency and better performance (obviously, compared to 3G devices). So, there you have it, the carrier decides that it can have 4G devices, without them being fully compliant to the standards.

We also inquired AT&T, and they first tried to explain that their devices take full advantage of the HSPA+ network in areas where it is combined with "enhanced backhaul". However, this simply means that HSPA+ capable handsets are able to take full advantage of the network in those areas. But when we pointed out that they actually lack such handsets, as all of the "4G" phones in their lineup, except for the Infuse 4G, currently max out at 14.4 Mbit/s (normal, 3G HSPA), they agreed. So it looks like they are just adding that "4G" part in their phones' names for the sake of attraction.

It turns out your “4G” phone may actually not be quite 4G, in case you are using one of those models that do not comply to the characteristics outlined in 3GPP's Release 7 and up. The best way to check if the model you're currently eying or having is truly HSPA+ 4G capable, is to take a look at its specs page on our site. In the General Info section (the first one), under Data, it should say “HSPA+ (4G)”, with maximum HSDPA speed of at least 21 Mbit/s (to be precise, it can have 17.6 Mbit/s download and still be 4G, as this is an additional 4G HSPA+ category, which, however, has not been used in phones).

It is clear that the way AT&T and T-Mobile are acting with regards to their “4G” phones isn't really upright, since a lot of users could be misled to believe they are actually using a device that is compliant to the official standards. To us, this isn't how a company should treat its customers. Now you can share your thoughts below!