T-Mobile is planning to shut down Sprint's LTE network on June 30, 2022, T-Mobile confirmed to Light Reading. The shuttering of Sprint's LTE network is part of an effort to merge the two networks following T-Mobile's purchase of Sprint.
T-Mobile is building a 5G network that uses Sprint spectrum and towers, and it is aiming to shift Sprint customers to the T-Mobile network instead of the Sprint network.
In addition to shutting down the Sprint LTE network, T-Mobile plans to deactivate Sprint's 3G CDMA network on January 1, 2022.
To ensure all customers can enjoy a more advanced 4G and 5G network, we will be retiring older network technologies to free up resources and spectrum that will help us strengthen our entire network, move all customers to more advanced technologies and bridge the Digital Divide. An additional part of this effort involves moving Sprint's LTE spectrum to the T-Mobile network.
At the current time, T-Mobile has transitioned approximately 33 percent of Sprint customers to the T-Mobile network. Before Sprint's LTE network is shuttered, customers will need to transition to T-Mobile by replacing their Sprint SIMs with a T-Mobile SIM and ensuring that Voice over LTE is enabled in the device settings for voice calls on applicable devices.
T-Mobile says that most Sprint LTE and 5G devices are compatible with T-Mobile's LTE and 5G networks.
