4G Explained

So what is 4G anyway, I mean we have seen it on carrier branding or commercials but there's no widely excepted definition of 4G or LTE. So let's try to explain that.

So as far as the name goes "4G" the "G" stands for a generation of mobile technology. With each new generation you get a significantly faster data speed but it becomes incompatible with the previous generation. In other words, you will never see a 3G phone working on a 4G network, but their are carriers that have both 3G and 4G networks (Verizon).

1G was the first Analog system and has the slowest data speed possible but at the point it was the only network available.

2G moves to digital but it's still very slow, somewhere around 10-200 kbps. Fun Fact: The first iPhone was 2G.

3G is a much faster digital and goes up to 384 kbps.

4G systems like LTE claim to initially start out at 5 Mbps, which is the highest network at the point. But 4G isn't just faster than all the other previous generations, it also has much more capacity, and their is alot less bandwidth caps

The complications that has people wondering what really is 4G is the fact that their are some really modern 3G networks that are actually faster than the beginnings of the 4G networks. For example, HSPA+  which is modernized 3G but the speed of this network can go up to 7 Mbps, because it's been evolved for so long. T-Mobile runs an HSPA+ network, and they plan to evolve it up to 30 Mbps.

The video showed you a comparison of 4G and 3G on 3 separate iPhones. Now you can actually see how fast 4G truly is when compared to other generation networks.