Just like 4G and 3G, 2G was kind of revolutionary back in its day. However with 5G on its way, 2G cellular technology certainly does feel downright ancient, and with pretty much all smartphones these days supporting LTE connectivity, there really is almost no need for 2G, or at least that’s as far as developed countries like the US are concerned.This is why it doesn’t come as a surprise to learn that AT&T has announced that they will be officially shutting down its 2G networks. As AT&T states on its website, this is actually something they’ve been announcing for the past 4 years, so in reality this was just a matter of time before it happened.
According to AT&T, “Today, our 3G and 4G LTE networks cover 99% of Americans. By shutting down our 2G network, this frees up more spectrum for future network technologies, including 5G. In the next few months, we plan to repurpose that spectrum for LTE.” It is unclear as to how many customers could potentially be affected by this, but like we said given how ubiquitous smartphones are, it’s hard to imagine that there are many people in the US that are still relying on feature phones that only have 2G connectivity.
As John Donovan, the Chief Strategy Officer and Group President at AT&T says, “The retirement of our 2G network – like our earlier retirement of the analog wireless network – is part of our 5G Evolution, which includes continued deployment of our 4G LTE and other technologies in the years to come.”
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