What you need to know
- T-Mobile will soon begin requiring that all phones on its network support VoLTE.
- Existing, non-compatible devices will no longer be supported from January 2021.
- This change takes effect for new devices and most existing customers as of August 4, 2020.
Wireless carrier T-Mobile recently announced that it would soon be requiring that all phones on its networks utilize VoLTE for voice communications. For those who may not know what VoLTE is, it is an acronym that stands for for Voice over LTE. Generally speaking, Voice over LTE is a protocol that allows voice communication to flow over higher-speed data connections, rather than older and slower legacy voice networks.
According to an internal T-Mobile memo discovered by Android Police, this change is expected to take effect for all new devices by August 4, 2020. Older, existing phones that do not support VoLTE will no longer be supported after the end of the year. Android Police also said this change will most certainly also affect Metro by T-Mobile customers, and could apply to other MVNOs on T-Mobile's network, such as Mint Mobile, Ting, and Consumer Cellular.
Existing customers who have phones that may be affected by this change will be notified soon, though an exact timeline hasn't been confirmed. Hopefully, T-Mobile will handle the situation better than rival AT&T. Earlier this week, AT&T caused quite the thanks to emails and text messages that were sent out to customers informing them (often incorrectly) that their devices would not be supported much longer, and that they would need to upgrade their devices to continue service.
If you are a T-Mobile customer and are unhappy with these announced changes, be sure to read our guides for how to cancel your T-Mobile service, and also be sure to check out our top picks for T-Mobile alternatives. Alternatively, if you're due for an upgrade anyway and you want to see the best phones that T-Mobile currently has to offer, we have a roundup for that as well!
Jeramy is proud to help *Keep Austin Weird* and loves hiking in the hill country of central Texas with a breakfast taco in each hand. When he's not writing about smart home gadgets and wearables, he's defending his relationship with his smart voice assistants to his family. You can follow him on Twitter at @jeramyutgw.
