News

Verizon Tops JD Power & Associates’ Call Quality Survey in Majority of Regions [Shocker]

45

You get what you pay for, they say, and those who pay more for Big Red’s massive coverage area and quality network couldn’t be smiling any harder right now. For the 13th consecutive volume, Verizon has topped their list in wireless call quality in nearly all regions – only AT&T has been able to tie them in the Mid-Atlantic region, while US Cellular has actually beaten them in the North Central region. (Not surprised considering US Cellular got their start in the Mid-West and hav been working feverishly to improve their network here.)

AT&T actually received decent scores in a few regions (again, they tied Verizon in one of them), but were dead last in the West and North Central – AT&T is notorious for dropped calls over in California and Nevada. (And the North Central result surprises me as I get exceptional coverage in my South Wisconsin town where Sprint and Verizon struggle. I’m only one man, though.)

T-Mobile – as many of you might have guessed – spent a majority of their time at the bottom of these lists. The only instances they weren’t last were when they were second to last in the North Central and West regions where AT&T failed. Sprint was average or above average in most regions, but was second to last in the Mid-Atlantic. Head on over to their site for the full slides. [Electronista]

Quentyn Kennemer
The "Google Phone" sounded too awesome to pass up, so I bought a G1. The rest is history. And yes, I know my name isn't Wilson.

Pixel Art Clock Widget Feeds You Your Time in Blocky Goodness

Previous article

Angry Birds Downloads Reach 30 Million as Conan O’Brian Plays it in Real Life [Video]

Next article

You may also like

45 Comments

  1. Haha, good one. “Shocker”. Hahahaha

  2. “T-Mobile – as many of you might have guessed – spent a majority of their time at the bottom of these lists.”

    Can’t wait for the T-Mobile fanboys to chime in–yes your service is cheap and therefore of a lesser quality. I’m on At&t. It’s ok, but Verizon would be my preference for call quality and LTE 4G data.

  3. That’s my current struggle. I can stick with T-Mobile where I have limited coverage, including none in some areas I travel to, or switch to Sprint or Verizon and pay another $25 per month.

  4. @NIsme… Your a bum

  5. Ok, goes with what I was saying a lil bit since the end of last year. I moved near my job and AT&T is actually better here than Verizon.
    .
    Seeing as its tied with Verizon as the best in Mid Atlantic States according to this, I’m not surprised.
    .
    Actually it’s 100% accurate with my lil experiment at work to find the best carrier for me now.
    .
    According to co workers and me on Verizon, Verizon and AT&T work the best where I live now, Sprint and T Mobile doesnt.

  6. You pay more with verizon/Sprint and you end up with a tiered plan

  7. I mean verizon/AT&T

  8. OOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHH, where are your bomb ass sprint and evo comments at on this one? even research shows that they suck!!! you are exactly where you belong, in the “i tired, but couldnt make it category”. so quit telling other people that they are bums because all of us telling you that you are wrong all this time, finally have proof. catch ya later, douche

  9. Ahh richard. Does sprints poor performance heremake you feel butthurt? Your not going on and on about how great that shit phone/shit network you have are. Its not like you.

  10. @jmax

    Can’t speak of other areas but here in florida att sucks just as much as tmo if not more. Att is the worst company ever. 2gb data? Gtfu

  11. C’mon guys…leave Richard alone. You give him a hard time when he protects Sprint and bashes the rest, and now you are giving him a hard time because he isn’t. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. Even though Richard may push his negativity to the stage about other carriers, it only really matters how you personally feel about your service and carrier.

  12. I just can’t wait for LTE to come to my area, should be by June of this year!!!!

  13. Jmax is the bum.

    The main reason for T-Mobile rankings is because there were quite a few outages for network upgrades.

  14. @Vlad
    Congrats on being the first butt hurt T-Mobile fanboy. My work provides my service with At&t, and I was grandfathered in with unlimited data :p

    Reasons I dislike T-Mobile:
    Their phones are butt ugly
    (Just look at the My Touch series)
    There service sucks
    (“T-Mobile – as many of you might have guessed – spent a majority of their time at the bottom of these lists.”)
    Their commercials are obnoxious.
    Lastly, HSPA+ isn’t nearly as promising as LTE–which At&t will be switching over to in the future.
    Like I mentioned before, I would prefer Verizon. But you can beat free service provided by your employer. I’ve had Sprint. I’d prefer Sprint over T-Mobile. Hell if U.S. Cellular had a better line up, I’d prefer them over T-Mobile as well. T-Mobile’s service is cheap. Bottom line: you get what you pay for.

  15. Oh I forgot the most important reason:
    Their users feel they have the best service, because they pay the least in price. Value is better served in quality not price.

  16. am on verizon now . i got a droid x as far as speed on the network data is slow as ba**s . It takes me 2 minutes to download a fu**ing picture ….. dam it. why why is this happening. can some please tell me whats wrong . sure i have better call reception but the data its on 3g but feels like edge. I came from t mobile where i had fast data speed but only when i could get 3g . which meant in a small part of the region .

  17. If the results are based upon surveys then just have a look at the replies here to realize it doesn’t matter. Not one reply here has said anything about call quality. Call quality also has so many variables as to be very difficult to fairly compare. The biggest thing to consider is what equipment your talking on.. you can have extremely different experiences with different handsets on the same network. Call quality is also a 2 way street and you have to take into account who you are talking to.. Are they on the same network ? Are they on a landline ? what type on equipment are they using to talk to you ? … Call quality requires extensive testing that can not be done by just calling someone and asking them.. because obviously that ends up being a numbers game.. I have a T mobile phone, and I have used AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon phones that all sounded bad in comparison.. BUT my handset is better than those.. so it doesn’t mean anything.

  18. This is about call quality, not which network is better. ATT covers huge areas in voice coverage, but has a much smaller data network. I have sprint because it is the best all around network FOR ME. It is cheaper, works just about everywhere, and data works just about everywhere too. Would I rather have Verizons network or ATT’s voice network? Absolutely, but there are always trade offs. I’m glad these tests are done because it reminds the smaller companies that they need to continue to grow their sub-par networks.

  19. I get great Sprint service here in Central Florida(Daytona Beach). It’s better than AT&T and on par with Verizon. I don’t know about T-Mobile.

  20. You get what you pay for my ass also what does this have to do with android?

  21. My post was about reception, even tho I didnt mention it…
    .
    Yall can have LTE for the speeds. Me? I wanna see if it makes my reception better. If it doesn’t, I will gladly stick with 3G….forever…..

  22. Well if Verizon was the best service where I live then I would switch, I always check their prices, phones and coverage once a year. At the moment if I did switch my phone bill would double and my data speeds would be 5 times slower but if I were to go to the country then I would have 3G still unlike on T-mobile.

  23. Im sure if I lived in the Northeast or somewhere else i would use the service that works best there. But Sprint works fine where im at, so i could care less.

  24. @Pross
    Nice excuse.

  25. This amounts to nothing… How a carrier’s coverage is based on where you live that DETERMINES WHO YOU WILL USE… In the City that never sleeps The Big Apple Sprint is the number 2 carrier and works very well.. As for @ksizzle9… My favorite DOPE her on Phandroid you must really live a sad life I laugh so much at you, your actually making my day more joyful you and that other Idiots @NIsme and @Dj… WHERE WERE YOU ksizzle9 when sprint DECIDED to make there announcement come March 22nd at CTIA introducing the LEGENDARY HTC EVO 2????? Don’t blame you for HIDING cause your network has NO ANSWER for the UPCOMING htc evo 2… This summer will be so much fun..

  26. Congrats to Verizon but really big deal none of the big four have total coverage. What works for you may not be the case for me and vice versa. All the fan-boy wars are pointless and childish. There really isn’t a No.1 company it is all in your head.

  27. ^ Oh. My. God. *very literally laughs out loud, shakes head, and walks away*

  28. @ Jon. Very well said sir.

  29. See MR. Evo AKA the husband of Sprint AKA Richard…we pay high for Verizon for a reason …

  30. @Jon
    Clearly you didnt even read the article. Of course there is a number 1! its verizon. JD power told me so! (I’m kidding of course.)

  31. I am not surprised about Verizon. In the 2 years, I owned Verizon i do not remember ever being without a signal….except in rural areas. I have tmobile and i’ve been all over the states with tmobile and coverage at times is shaky but the one thing Tmobile has going for it that the other carriers don’t is the wi-fi calling…Anytime you have issues with coverage, At&T Verizon and Sprint charges you for a network extender that can be pricey vs tmobile allows you to use your wifi connection to boost signal

  32. @MensahWatts… Yeah tell me why all you BIG TIME DWEEBS pay your high prices for VERIZON???? It definitely isn’t because of there great quality of devices… OR there great ability to UPDATE THERE DEVICES… Verizon is OVERATED and specialist in RIPPING OFF AND OVER CHARGING CUSTOMERS… All you folks are TWISTED with this Verizon GARBAGE… In New York we BITCH SLAP VERIZON AND THERE CUSTOMERS…

  33. I really don’t know how many times I’ve stated that I would love to jump ship from VZW for a less expensive service..I have six lines thru VZW; just on the family plan(5+1). When I look at the bill every month and look at what other providers charge (look up what US Cellular charges), it is unbelievably aggravating to see that I (theoretically)could pay about the same for 6 smartphones on US Cellular as I do for 1 smartphone and 5 feature phones The only reason I stay with VZW is simply because I sometimes have to travel far away from my hometown, and over the years, VZW has proven the most reliable overall for my purposes. If you live and work in an area where you don’t really ever travel very far, then obviously, you want to stick with the cheapest provider with good service in your area. I am not a “proud Verizon customer”; I could careless if “Billy-Bob’s New-Fangled Celly-Fone Services” could provide the coverage I need – if they could provide what I need for less than VZW, I’d be gone in a minute. I am not even going to bother to comment on specific comments in this thread. Verizon topped a JD Power survey, was anyone surprised, and so what? As Jon stated, being a carrier fanboy is pointless – you go with what works for you the best at the minimum cost, and when it comes to telecommunication devices – no matter how smart your smartphone – if you can’t make a phone call, you bascially have a mini tablet with no connection – so you’ll be good if you want to play Angry Birds while you’re broken down somewhere in the boondocks, but you won’t be able to do what the primary function of your smartphone is – make a damn phone call.
    Somehow, this will be translated by certain people as “DJ is a raging Verizon fanboy”…whatever, I’m a fan of what works the best for me, if Billy-Bob’s New-Fangled Celly-Fone Services suddenly launches a nationwide dense-coverage network for $60/month unlimited, I’d pay the ETF’s on all the phones – although I’m done on my contract and waiting to see what I’m going to do on the NF2 if the TBolt ever comes out and is running well.

  34. You said it well DJ…but truthfully being somewhat of a phanboy for what works best…nothing wrong with that. And Richard…inow know 100% that the only reason your a raging Sprint fanboy is cause your on Sprint….so it does not mater to you how many millions of test show Sprint is not the top dog and Verizon is …you will always be faithful to your wife Sprint…lol…and lol once more

  35. Exactly MensahWatts. I am a fan of what is best for me all around -I’m objective. Richard…is one of “God’s special little creatures”. I can’t really berate him anymore after having a bored 10 minutes one day, and for shits and giggles, I typed his name into youtube, and after watching 3 of his videos, I realized that he is genuinely…”Special”, thus I generally gloss over his comments, although I occasionaly catch one, there is no conversation at all, it is either EVO God of Creation, or “Sprint the Now Network rules telecommunications throughout the galaxy”, or you’re a dweeb, bum, tired and need rest, must have sex with ducks, are an asswipe, or any number of laughable “insults”. Its nice NYC has been giving smartphones to the developmentaly disabled, the homless, and insane via their ‘reachout’ program.

  36. ^ to be clear, I am not making fun of, nor in any way belittling any of those demographic groups singularaly, or collectively.

  37. DJ that’s funny…I will look him up now. And yeah …He must …has to be very young. It really wouldn’t make sense for a older guy to carry on like him.

  38. I feel bad after watching his videos. Sorry Richard. I get it now.

  39. Everyone knows verizon is best but the question becomes how much do you want to pay? With their plans for tiered 4G service I can see a family plan with 2 lines and limited minutes and data costing well over $200 month per month. I pay $175 with taxes included for 2 phones with unlimited everything. (G2 & Nexus One). I can’t say that I am satisfied 100% of the time but at least the price is right.

  40. That list really doesn’t mean crap. I have tmobile service and have never dropped a call. But when I was with at&t I dropped every other call. So I take what anyone says about service with a grain of salt. The best service is which ever one works best for you. All this fanboyism is so pathetic. People really need to act their age not their shoe size.

  41. I tried AT&T. Spotty coverage and voice calls had a weird hum.

    I tried Sprint. Didn’t like customer service/stores/wait time. 3G was pretty legit. 4G was sick when you could get it…sucked at my apartment/indoors.

    I skipped T-Mobile…friends said it sucks.

    I’m on Verizon. Call quality is sick (voice over LTE should be unbelievable). Usually get good 3G (about 2-ish mbps down)… but my Droid X is flakey sometimes. pretty sure it’s the phone.

    I wish I could pay extra and get some hybrid phone that worked off some hybrid network. My only concern is what the hell to do when I go abroad.

  42. I hear you, fiveizzo-unlike the call clarity on my VZW work phone
    it’s horrible. I’d take TMO any day over VZW or even an AT&T phone with dropped calls every other call to just be able to actually hear my clients on my VZW phone.

  43. check out the article below for more details about the jd power study

    http://www.thedailytech.co/2011/03/06/verizon-comes-out-on-top-in-jd-power-call-quality-study/

Leave a reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

More in News