Telefónica’s 3G network (UMTS) will be switched off until the end 2021. This was announced by the mobile operator, which markets its offer in Germany under the name O2. Previously, Telefónica had only roughly stated that the UMTS network would be pulped by the end of 2022.

The company justifies the fact that it should now go faster with progress in network expansion: Existing 3G technology in the O2 network can be converted to 4G faster than planned. Telefónica intends to use the frequency spectrum previously used for 3G at 2. 100 MHz for 4G and 5G networks. “With 4G and 5G we are getting more bandwidth from the same frequency spectrum and thus a significantly better customer experience,” says Mallik Rao, Chief Technology Officer at Telefónica Deutschland.

Telefónica’s revised schedule is now more in line with that of the competition: Deutsche Telekom has already announced that it will open its own UMTS network on 30. June 2021 to want to switch off. This is also for Vodafone 30. June Key date for 3G shutdown.

“Days of 3G are counted” “3G was important for the breakthrough in mobile data communication in Germany,” said Markus Haas, CEO of Telefónica Deutschland, commenting on the shutdown of the UMTS network. “But after years the days of this technology are numbered.”

According to Telefónica, most of the data in the O2 network has long been transmitted via the UMTS successor LTE (4G). 2016 should still 44 percent of the data flow over 3G through the O2 network be, meanwhile it is less than ten percent. 4G enables speeds of up to 225 Mbit / s, 3G on the other hand only 42 Mbit / s.

Like Telekom, Telefónica continues to offer a 2G network as a base network, which can still be used to handle calls, for example. The company claims to have 44 million customers, of whom over 97 percent already use a 4G-capable device.

(dahe)