There’s nothing like a good sibling rivalry to keep a growing family of products interesting, and this head-to-head shootout between the two flavors of iPhone 4 will tell you everything you need to know about which carrier is right for you.
Those Apple commercials were right. Two is better than one.
Not quite. You know Verizon’s iPhone 4 supports its CDMA network, while AT&T’s model talks to its GSM towers. But did you know the Verizon iPhone is technically capable of accessing both cellular networks? Thing is, it can’t (not yet, anyway…), but if you needed any further evidence that Apple intends to ship just one iPhone to the whole world with the eventual release of the iPhone 5, it’s sitting on the shelves of your local Verizon store.
WINNER: TIE
There’s more going on in the Verizon iPhone’s antenna, which was redesigned to accommodate its CDMA network, than meets the eye. Sure, now the black notches along the iPhone’s exterior silver band are symmetrical, but more importantly, the Verizon iPhone’s buttons are in slightly different positions compared to the original iPhone 4, meaning some cases designed for AT&T’s model won’t fit perfectly with the new hotness on Verizon. Fortunately, manufacturers have already stepped
up to keep your shiny new Verizon
iPhone protected.
WINNER: TIE
While the AT&T iPhone 4 was famously plagued by the “death grip” issue that diminished cellular reception if the phone was held a certain way, there have been few reports of similar problems from Verizon iPhone users. Sure, similar issues affect other phones on the market to one degree or another, but for now no news is good news for Verizon’s iPhone 4.
WINNER: VERIZON
Of all the hassles we’ve endured with the iPhone 4 on AT&T, its vibrator was never one of them (yeah, we know how that sounds). But as is so often the case, Cupertino knew better. The Verizon iPhone 4 sports a new, quieter oscillating vibrator instead of the AT&T model’s rotational motor and counterweight.
WINNER: VERIZON
Weight is another iPhone 4 issue that never bothered us much (we can deal with toting around a five-ounce computer...as long as it plays Battleheart). But once again Cupertino’s industrial elves have shown that when they do something twice, there’s no reason not to do it better. Or in this case, lighter. That’s right, the Verizon iPhone’s battery weighs a whopping 1.3 grams less than the one in the original model. The way we see it, Verizon customers deserve a lighter load after all the years they spent waiting for the world’s coolest smartphone.
WINNER: VERIZON
It’s simple: the Verizon iPhone doesn’t use a SIM card, so there’s no unsightly SIM tray and paperclip hole to mar its antenna band with collected pocket lint. You just know Steve Jobs and Jonathan Ive have gotta be happy about that.
WINNER: VERIZON
To hear the commercials tell it, AT&T’s 3G data network is significantly faster than Big Red’s, but Verizon offers better voice quality and fewer dropped calls. Chalk up a rare victory for truth in advertising: early reviews and Mac|Life’s highly (un)scientific testing
on the streets of San Francisco bear out those claims.
WINNER: TIE
A major difference between AT&T and Verizon’s networks is simultaneous voice and 3G data. Simply put, AT&T has it, Verizon doesn’t (it’s an unavoidable limitation of Big Red’s CDMA technology). But that’s just the tip of the cellular iceberg. While conference calls on AT&T allow up to five calls simultaneously, Verizon limits you to only two. And when switching calls on Verizon, you can’t switch between calls if the second one was outgoing. But you can merge them, unless the second call was incoming. However, if you end the second or the merged call, you’ll lose both. Yeesh, who can keep track of all that?
WINNER: AT&T
The infamous Wi-Fi hotspot looks clean and straightforward on your lock screen.
Since the announcement of the Verizon iPhone, attention has fallen on its Wi-Fi hotspot feature, which allows users to share their iPhone’s cellular data connection with up to five MacBooks, iPads, or other Wi-Fi gizmos. It was rad then, and it’s rad now. AT&T has since implemented the feature in iOS 4.3, but you can only add the feature if you already have tethering, which you don’t need if you have a Wi-Fi hotspot.
WINNER: VERIZON
Smartphone owners know voice and data plans are where smartphone rubber meets the road. At first glance, AT&T and Verizon’s offerings are neck and neck: voice plans cost between $39.99 and $69.99 a month for 450 minutes to unlimited talk time. Monthly texting plans are similarly close, but Verizon edges out AT&T at the low end with $5 for 250 messages compared to AT&T’s $10 for 1,000 messages.
With data, things get trickier. AT&T’s DataPlus plan gives 200MB a month for $15; a 2GB DataPro plan costs $25 monthly. Tethering (at press time, without a Wi-Fi hotspot) is available to DataPro users for $20 more per month and adds 2GB to the data ceiling.
Verizon keeps it simple with monthly unlimited data for $30 and hotspot-enabled tethering for an extra $20 a month. However, data reserved for tethering is limited to 2GB. We knew there had to be a catch somewhere.
WINNER: TIE
But even the best smartphone with the most comprehensive plan can’t do much for you if you don’t have good coverage. This is where the fight literally comes home: the only winner that really matters is the carrier that reaches the most places—indoors and out—in your neck of the woods. But a comparison of AT&T’s coverage map (http://goo.gl/1OPr) with Verizon’s (http://goo.gl/Q8YU) gives Big Red the edge outside big cities and in some central and mountain states. Make sure to check out the areas you use your phone, but from the big-picture perspective, it’s
WINNER: VERIZON
Though much has been said about the slightly different volume buttons on the Verizon iPhone, it’s a miniscule change. Basically, the Verizon iPhone and the AT&T iPhone are the same phone with almost the exact same bodies. But they aren’t identical, so we’ll help you differentiate between the two with nothing more than a glance.
The AT&T iPhone has a barely noticeable SIM card slot on the side; the Verizon iPhone doesn’t.
The Verizon iPhone also dropped the legal “hieroglyphics,” making for a cleaner look on the back.
The Verizon iPhone (left) has a CDMA antenna; the AT&T iPhone (right) utilizes GSM technology.
Ample evidence suggests that the iPhone 5 will sport a dual GSM-CDMA chip (the Verizon iPhone already has one, for starters). If nothing else were to change, that would still mean you could sport an iPhone that could easily be switched from one carrier to the next, making it ideal for travelers and, well, anyone. The iPhone 5 will inevitably launch a few months from now, so Mac|Life’s official recommendation is to sit tight.
