How is AT&T LTE network and coverage?

[tonyr6]

I am asking because T-Mobile is getting slower with there speeds. I learned this after going on a road trip two weeks ago and had no or limited coverage in many places and where I had LTE coverage it was basically dial up speeds and unusable. The visiting my cousin he lives in Avonmore PA, 15618 zip where he has AT&T coverage I got nothing just Emergency Calls but I was still able to use his Wifi but I was restricted to only his house.

The last straw is the fact in downtown Brooklyn 11217 zip I use to get enough speeds to stream music now with T-Mobile Band 12 700 Mhz it is actually worse with 4 bars of LTE but practically a dead connection. Download is 0.1 upload is 0.0 if I can get the speed test to load many times webpages time out. I live in the same zip but the reason why I get good speeds in my house about 8mb down and up is because of my T-Mobile LTE repeater which forces Band 4 only.

Right now I am paying about $140 for three lines I have the Nexus 6P my parents have the Nexus 5 I bought the 6P and my parents already paid there Nexus 5 so all phones are unlocked. The only thing I really loved about T-Mobile is the unlimited streaming but what is the point when I walk around now the city and I can even stream pre-cached services like Apple Music forget about live streaming stations which I can't even use anymore. How much more would it be for three lines and bringing our own phones? Thanks.

 

[cohoman]

I believe your question I'd highly dependent on your location. I live on the West Coast and have taken several family road trips all over the Southwest with very good coverage. I'm very impressed with ATT's LTE coverage too. Of course, you could have the opposite experience on the East coast where you seem to live.

 

[TWC42]

Look at the coverage map carefully. AT&T is pretty solid in the Northeast.. Here in MD, it's great, and the only one of the four major carriers that has good coverage in western MD.
Look into some of the deals AT&T may be offering to switch. You may want WiFi calling, and IIRC, AT&T only enables it on their own branded phones.

 

[IAmSixNine]

what phone were you using during this trip?

also get a prepaid cricket sim card and test with an att phone. This will work so much better for you as it will give you real world results.

 

[tonyr6]

also get a prepaid cricket sim card and test with an att phone. This will work so much better for you as it will give you real world results.

I forgot Cricket uses AT&T network. I will try that.

 

[djhayes1977]

Look at the coverage map carefully. AT&T is pretty solid in the Northeast.. Here in MD, it's great, and the only one of the four major carriers that has good coverage in western MD.
Look into some of the deals AT&T may be offering to switch. You may want WiFi calling, and IIRC, AT&T only enables it on their own branded phones.

I'm in central Maryland and am also considering the switch from T-Mobile to AT&T due to dropping calls and speed reduction. Map looks pretty solid as far as coverage but I like real world experiences. Might also bite on the direct tv promo which gives unlimited data if you bundle. Can you share your experience with AT&T as far as speed, reliability and call quality??

 

[TWC42]

.... Can you share your experience with AT&T as far as speed, reliability and call quality??

Speed, can't comment as we don't stream. Most intensive data usage might be downloading a radar in motion image, and it is fine. Reliability and call quality are great, had one network outage (abt 4 hours) in western MD once during the past year (other carriers were down, too, must have been a tower issue). Call quality varies from good to great, depending on the call being strictly network, or switched to wifi. I do get as low as one bar in some places inside my house, and calling is switched over seamlessly to wifi on my Galaxy S7 and wife's iPhone SE.

 

[anon(9898026)]

I've used att all over the us with good success overall. I'm on the east coast most of the time and have been pleased with the coverage both in cities and rural. The LTE performance has been the most reliable for me out of all the carriers. You can always test them out with a cheap prepaid to make sure

Out of all of the big 4 carriers at&t has had the least outages by far. Even less than Verizon. I fell for the Verizon marketing and it was the worst ever. At&t is pretty solid these days from my experience

 

[Rukbat]

How it is depends on where it is. In 11217 it could be terrible, but standing near the ferry terminal across the harbor you could be getting excellent speeds - or it could be worse.

And it can change - with the time of day, the day of the week ... or seemingly randomly. (That's one reason your data speeds are listed as "up to" - they can control the speed from your phone to their gateway. After that it's not their equipment, so they have no control over speed.)

Where I am, AT&T is solid - in town. In the next town over, there's no signal at all. Verizon has decent signal in both places - but is the most expensive service. And Sprint? It's a joke in both places.

But that's now. Next month, or next year, everything may change. (No, the networks aren't "within 1%" or whatever Sprint's ads say - they're close in certain areas. In other areas they're not.) Even back when I was in the business, around the turn of the century, I carried 3 phones (I was a dealer for 4 carriers) - Verizon was getting more and more crowded, so they kept dropping more and more calls. But in some places, they were the only carrier with signal. It hasn't changed - and it won't change. As conditions change, your carrier should too.

 

[tonyr6]

Thanks. I will most likely try a prepaid card. I just asked here because searching if my T-Mobile Sim was bad gave me snake oil useless responses like you might have malware on your phone. Every solution to every problem is "you must have malware".

 

[Kayza]

In the areas of Brooklyn that I am in, I've have very solid coverage with AT&T - equal to or better than T-Mobile. If your phones are unlocked, maybe get a Go plan sim, to test on and see how good your coverage is.

For $140, you can get an unlimited talk and text + 10 gb of shared data for 3 phones. If you want something like the T-Mobile "unlimited" plan, AT&T does have something like that, but for 3 phones it's going to be $180 or so. Depending on what you actually use AT&T might work well for you pricewise, or not.

Another thing to look at are the vendors that use AT&T's network. H2O is an independent network that used AT&T's network, so should work wherever AT&T does - but it's generally a lot cheaper. Also, AT&T has a "value" brand - Cricket Wireless. Again, since it is AT&T, it will work wherever AT&T works, but it should be cheaper for you.

 

[tonyr6]

My Nexus 6p was bought from Newegg so it is unlocked.

 

[anon(9898026)]

Did you end up trying prepaid?

 

[tonyr6]

Did you end up trying prepaid?

What is the best prepaid card?

 

[Kayza]

If you have an unlocked phone, then it really doesn't make a difference - just try one and see if you get coverage. If you get good service you can then look at which plan makes the most financial sense for you.

 

[jumblednonsense]

The only problem I noticed with AT&T when I was last in the city (in October), was that I had terrible service when in Astoria, trying to meet up with a friend. I had to switch to my TMobile prepaid SIM in order to even make a phone call. I also did notice that I had lots of issues streaming Apple Music via TMobile, which got frustrating at times.