4G is the new buzzword in town. If you follow the tech news you might have seen the advertisements and packages featuring 4G and LTE from various mobile network operators. Though at the moment you might only have seen such offers from Zong, who won the first ever 4G license auctioned in Pakistan by the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), and Warid Telecom who was allowed by the PTA to go public with 4G LTE services.

What exactly are 4G/LTE? In a nutshell, it is the fourth generation of mobile telecommunications technology which offers a significant increase in data speeds compared to its predecessor. LTE falls a bit short of the peak speed of 4G. According to the International Mobile Telecommunications Advanced (IMT-Advanced), it is branded as such. This is because it offers a substantial level of improvement in performance compared to the third generational systems (3G).

Zong was the first mobile network operator to successfully offer 4G services in Pakistan. From what I have experienced while using their service is that the data speed hovered around the 20Mbps mark and even reached 30Mbps, which is astonishing nonetheless. In comparison to my DSL Broadband speed, it was consistent within Lahore.

The users of the network whom I talked to praised it for its sheer speed and the coverage which allowed them to stay connected while on the go.

They had one issue: its price. As Zong also offers 3G, they said they had no problem switching to it to avoid costs as they still got a respectable performance.

Warid followed suit and released their 4G services with LTE branding. After using their network as well, I can safely say they indeed have great coverage and data speeds, comparable to Zong’s.

Although Warid LTE users had mixed views, many were happy with the speed. But those living in the outskirts of Lahore, such as in DHA, said they were not getting the full speed. They said the performance wasn’t greatly better than what they had got from their 3G networks.

The jump from 3G to 4G is much less noticeable to the average consumer than the jump from 2G to 3G, which is a phenomenal increase. Thus, 4G is more of an evolution than a revolution.

It might be an overkill for the average consumer at the moment. Though, according to the stats released by PTA indicating 3G/4G subscribers for the month of April, Zong has 61,964 4G subscribers and Waird has 79,213 LTE subscribers.

There are some caveats aside from getting a 4G supported sim. You must also have a phone that supports 4G. Also, not only should it contain the 4G radio but also support the bands that are provided by the telecom operators. But that may not be such a big problem as many of the devices now released support a huge array of bands, still one may have to check their mobiles compatibility with the 4G sim they want to buy if they want to take advantage of the new technology.

In the end, should you make the jump to 4G or not? That depends on you, the consumer. If you are the type of person who likes to be on the cutting edge of technology, won’t settle for anything but the best and don’t mind spending a little extra, then 4G is for you. If you are on a tight budget and simply don’t want to get into the hassle of fulfilling all the requirements and necessities for using 4G then you might be better off waiting for the price to fall down and the whole process to become easier for you.

Also, the coverage of 4G is available only in the major cities of Pakistan at the moment. So, it may not be accessible to people living in an unsupported area but coverage is bound to get better.

As time passes the problems surrounding 4G would start to fade away. As its price lowers and the coverage increases only, more and more people are likely to embrace the new technology in Pakistan.