MetroPCS joined competitors Cricket and US Cellular today in offering free nationwide coverage to the carrier's subscribers, and announced that it has turned on its 4G LTE network in both Philadelphia and Los Angeles.
Metro's new Metro USA plan lets MetroPCS subscribers talk, text, and access some Web services in parts of 48 states - everywhere except Alaska and Montana, according to the carrier's coverage map. That doesn't mean they cover all of each state. Only the eastern half of Kansas is part of the plan, for example, and much of rural southern Georgia, northern Wisconsin, and northern Michigan seem to be out, according to the carrier's Web-based coverage map (shown above; click on it for a larger version).
People in the newly covered areas can't sign up for MetroPCS service. Like with Cricket and US Cellular, this is basically a free roaming deal. MetroPCS subscribers can also roam in the rest of the country, beyond the Metro USA areas, for 19 cents per voice minute.
MetroPCS, Cricket, and US Cellular are making these deals because they don't have licenses to sell service across the whole country, but they want to offer service that's competitive to the four, big national carriers. Cricket will take things a step further next year when it starts selling service outside its own territories that use the Cricket brand, but on the Sprint network.
Metro also turned on 4G LTE in Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and Bakersfield, CA today. The company still has one 4G phone, the Samsung Craft. The new cities join Dallas, Detroit, and Las Vegas, which already had LTE service. According to MetroPCS's Web site, 4G will "soon" come to Atlanta, Boston, New York City, Sacramento, San Francisco, and much of Florida as well.
MetroPCS's 4G plan is very inexpensive at $55-60 per month, but service so far is much like you'd expect on other carriers' 3G. That's because Metro's goals for 4G are different from other carriers'. MetroPCS never had 3G at all, so it's using relatively slow 4G services to catch up with the 3G media and video services offered by its competitors.
"MetroPCS is committed to meeting consumers' demands relating to the small screen, and has plans to introduce new handsets and smartphones in the future," the company said in a press release.
MetroPCS is the fifth-largest wireless carrier in the U.S., with 7.9 million subscribers. The company's licenses cover about 146 million Americans.