Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past nine months or so, you probably already know that T-Mobile managed to turn life’s (read the pandemic’s) lemons into lemonade, enjoying industry-leading growth primarily as a result of completing its long-in-the-works Sprint acquisition last year.
But while the “Un-carrier” could have never surpassed AT&T’s subscriber numbers without absorbing a large part of the “Now Network’s” customer base, the net gains recorded during the final six months of 2020 had almost nothing to do with the $26 billion mega merger.
We’re talking more than 1.7 million total customer additions and 1.6 million postpaid net additions in Q4 alone, according to the company’s latest preliminary report, with both figures dropping from the year’s mind-blowing July – September timeframe but surging compared to the same period back in 2019.
Overall, T-Mo impressively managed to pick up over 5.6 million customers in 2020, nearly 5.5 million of which signed up to the operator’s postpaid services to not only improve the previous year’s 4.8 million total, but also set a new all-time record for the nation’s fast-growing number two carrier.
While Magenta undoubtedly drew in new customers and strengthened the loyalty of existing ones by offering unrivaled deals and promotions essentially all year long, many analysts believe this incredible progress is also closely related to T-Mobile’s early 5G supremacy. To highlight its dominant market position… yet again, T-Mo just announced a huge new achievement.
Despite aiming to “only” cover 100 million people with its Ultra Capacity 5G signal by the end of 2020, the “Un-carrier” got that number all the way up to 106 million. Unsurprisingly, T-Mobile couldn’t waste another golden opportunity to mock Verizon, pointing out that its arch-rival’s 5G Ultra Wideband service is merely available for an estimated 2 million people across the country right now.
Of course, that’s not an entirely fair comparison, as Ultra Capacity brings together mid-band and high-band spectrum, whereas Ultra Wideband is based exclusively on blazing fast mmWave technology. But until Verizon can truly compete in the crucial mid-band 5G arena, T-Mobile has every right to trumpet its crushing industry lead, especially considering the 280 million people covered by its “nationwide” 5G network, which combines all three spectrum flavors in a bid to (eventually) deliver a perfect cake for all.
