I was in the exact same boat as you, OP. The 4g phones out are too big for my liking, and they are battery hogs. I go to school in a 4g area. I guess it just depends on the user. I don't intend to do any hotspot or tethering, or streaming stuff. Sure some YouTube and fm radio maybe, but nothing hardcore. For web surfing 4g will load most pages a whopping 4 seconds faster. Oh the humanity! Lol.
So what I was looking for was battery life and the right size. This phone is it. Perfect size and excellent battery life. I get full signal almost everywhere so my speed is excellent. I could not be happier with my choice. But if ur looking to download torrents or something, stream hd video, tether, hotspot stuff then I suppose u could be disappointed? I don't even know bc I've never even tried to do any of that stuff on this phone. I only worried I made the wrong choice until I activated this bad boy. When a 4g device has 4", dual core, equally good battery as this, data+voice over 3 and 4g, 12mp cam, then maybe I will miss having that device. That device is a ways away though I think. I hope I helped!