Today, T-Mobile announced a partnership with GCI, allowing the Un-carrier to bring its nationwide 5G network to Alaska. While the company already boasts having the only nationwide 5G network, this makes T-Mobile the first firm to offer 5G service in all 50 states.
"The massive nationwide 5G network we’re building and expanding by the day - paired with important partnerships like this - extend our 5G leadership over the competition and deliver meaningful 5G experiences to our customers," said Neville Ray, president of technology at T-Mobile. "Now, our customers with 5G devices can keep 5G service when in Alaska. And to GCI customers, welcome to nationwide 5G!"
T-Mobile first launched its nationwide 5G network in December, and it"s continued to expand since that, both in terms of devices and in terms of service. At launch, the only devices to support the new 600MHz 5G service were the OnePlus 7T Pro 5G McLaren and the Samsung Galaxy Note10 5G. It also had the S10+ prior to nationwide sub6 5G, but that only supported mmWave. Now, the Galaxy S20+ and S20 Ultra support both sub6 and mmWave, and T-Mobile has devices like the OnePlus 8, LG V60 ThinQ, and Samsung Galaxy S20 for sub6 5G.
Service has expanded as well. Since the company"s acquisition of rival carrier Sprint was finalized in April, T-Mobile has been working hard on bring the 2.5GHz band over to its devices. In fact, New York City is now the first to have low-band sub6, mid-band sub6, and mmWave, which is the full set of spectrums that"s supposed to make up 5G.
In Alaska, through the partnership with GCI, T-Mobile customers will be able to access the 600MHz band that customers elsewhere have had access to since December.