T-Mobile to finally turn off 2G in 2024

T-Mobile recently disclosed that it will turn off its 2G GSM network on April 2, 2024. The move follows the operator’s dismantling of its 3G networks, and Sprint’s 3G and 4G networks, during 2022.

“Across the industry, wireless companies have retired older network technologies as part of an important progression to ensure all customers can enjoy a more advanced 4G and 5G network,” T-Mobile explained on its website. “Moving customers who are on old networks onto modern, advanced high-speed networks means they will need to have phones and devices that can tap into the latest technologies.”

T-Mobile’s 2G shutdown will happen almost seven years after AT&T shut down its own 2G GSM network. AT&T discontinued service on its 2G network in 2017. According to AT&T’s filings with the SEC around that time, it counted 4 million customers on its 2G network, the bulk of which were IoT devices.

To be clear, all of the nation’s mobile network operators have been working to shift customers from older, legacy networking technologies and onto newer, more efficient standards including 4G and 5G.

For 2G specifically, T-Mobile’s move to shutter its network is noteworthy considering the technology recently entered its fourth decade of service in some parts of the world. First launched in the early 1990s, a number of mobile network operators across the globe have moved to shutter their 3G networks before turning off 2G. That’s partly because some feature phones and some Internet of things services still use 2G connections.

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