Is T-Mobile better than AT&T?

Posted on: 10 Aug 2024
Is T-Mobile better than AT&T?

T-Mobile and AT&T provide rather intriguing offers for your smartphone and connection requirements thanks to the two of the biggest cellular carriers in the United States. Of the two, nevertheless, which one ought you to pick? I will examine closely the provider's coverage, speeds, plans, and features in my T-Mobile vs AT&T comparison to assist you.

Network Coverage & Reliability

For coverage, traditionally AT&T has enjoyed a wider 4G LTE network than that of T-Mobile. Nevertheless, with the merger between T-Mobile and Sprint and numerous 5G expansions that the two companies embarked on, they are almost at par with AT&T.

All of the networks today have expanded their internet service to over 300 million people across the country with their 4G LTE and their incredibly fast 5G networks. Surprisingly, the fact is that T-Mobile has the largest coverage of 5G, which is available across more than 310 million people in the United States while the 5G by AT&T is accessible to over 280 million individuals as per the data of January 2023.

Even today, in rural regions, one can observe that AT&T has a somewhat higher 4G reliability than T-Mobile. Even the surveys conducted by other authors, like RootMetrics, reveal that AT&T Internet remains the clear leader in terms of coverage across the USA geographies in 2022. Still, the company under consideration maintains the gap in this sphere as well by its extensive range of 5G expansion.

In most of the use cases today, both carriers offer great nationwide coverage, with AT&T having slightly better rural coverage than T-Mobile, while the latter provides slightly better coverage when it comes to 5G.

Network Speeds & Performance

T-Mobile has emerged as one of the more distinct examples in recent years of a firm that has cultivated a reputation for speed. From a user perspective, their average download speeds of roughly 100 Mbps nationally on average according to outside tests and calculations, which makes them the fastest of all the national wireless companies.

The speeds of AT&T 5G are also decent; nationwide, they average above 50 Mbps as they expand fast mid-band spectrum and overall capacity further. It wasn’t as fast as T-Mobile today but their 5G network is still quite fast and responsive nearly everywhere across the regions.

T-Mobile also becomes the first to turn on new features that the company has never started before, such as multi-band aggregation to deliver the absolute best speeds possible to devices that support it. They are currently the fastest wireless carrier as the current improvements in the 5G make the ultimate speeds above 1Gbps in certain regions.

Plan Options & Pricing

The two carriers both provide a single smartphone plan that costs $50 per month for the choices of online signup, auto-pay, or paperless billing. T-Mobile ONE has data limits where speeds after 50GB may be slowed down while T-Mobile Magenta has 100GB of high-priority data allowed. AT&T Unlimited Starter is packed with unlimited talk, text, and data with up to 5G speeds depending on serviceability.

For families sharing data across multiple devices, the price may fluctuate but the basic rate is $30 for every added line depending on current offers. T-Mobile Essentials also provides 5GB of mobile data each month at 5G speeds for $27 per line for four lines ($140 in total).

AT&T offers the Unlimited Your Way multi-line plan where you get four lines for $35 per line, on auto-pay, paperless billing. Thus, money of $140 for a whole month provides all the family members with unlimited calls, messaging, and high-priority data on the 5G connection where available. Lines over four are $20 per additional line with a limit of 10 lines.

Prepaid, services are also available without credit checks, senior citizens, and a military/first responder discount for customers interested in cost-saving. Pricing and the ability to adjust plans are also somewhat similar and competitive between the two.

Phone Selection & Deals

Being two of the biggest telecommunication companies in America, T-Mobile, and AT&T boast all the latest Apple iPhones and Samsung Galaxy smartphones for an outright purchase or easy as well as flexible payment on installment credit.

Now and then, AT&T provides new product exclusivity such as the release of new Samsung Galaxy gadgets in a year. On the other hand, T-Mobile allows its subscribers to unleash the full potential of their handset if bought directly from the provider together with the option of financing the purchase.

AT&T and T-Mobile for example usually regularly have campaigns where they’ll waive switching costs, give instant credit of up to several hundred dollars, and even gift cards once you switch and bring your number to them. While AT&T is known for providing larger trade-in credit for gadgets with an older model turned in, T-Mobile is known for its higher upfront discounts on the latest models. Both will work well for negotiating good phone deals when you switch over.

Extras & Perks

T-Mobile also provides lots of complimentary features that customers can enjoy such as one hour of Gogo inflight WiFi on domestic flights, unlimited texting worldwide, one hour of free WiFi on all the Gogo flights, and unlimited music streaming which does not affect data with services like pandora, heart radio, Spotify and the rest.

Most of these perks are matched with similar offers by AT&T, which includes an additional one hour of free Gogo in-flight WiFi, as well as international roaming in over 200 countries across the world. As a bonus, their Unlimited Elite plan comes with an HBO Max streaming subscription on top of that.

Both also allow you to watch as much video and music as you wish from popular services and it doesn’t count toward your monthly data allotment when on an unlimited plan. Specific bonuses and additional attractive features can be said to be relatively comparable with the two giants.

So What Is The Conclusion? Which Carrier is Better?

When looking at the job profile, it is a close call between the two companies with AT&T and T-Mobile offering great service in general. So to sum it up, is ultimate decision is focused on what feature is most important in your use.

T-Mobile is one of the top 5G providers today and if you want the fastest 5G data speeds possible then this is your provider. For still the best rural and nationwide 4G LTE coverage, they recommend consumers go for AT&T. The plans, pricing, and phone deals in both companies are as similar as one could imagine.

Hopefully, this brings out the most comprehensive analysis of the differences and similarities that exist between T-Mobile and AT&T. Visit their internet sites to compare the latest plan rates and to assess the quality in the specific area code of their services before changing wireless providers.

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