AT&T’s misleading “5G E” indicator comes to 4G iPhones in iOS 12.2 beta

Enlarge / A smartphone with AT&T's "5G E" network indicator. (credit: AT&T)

AT&T's misleading "5G E" network indicator for 4G phones, which was rolled out to some Android smartphones last month, has now come to iPhones in a beta version of iOS 12.2.

AT&T customers who installed the second beta of iOS 12.2 "are noticing their iPhones displaying a '5G E' connection to AT&T's network," MacRumors reported yesterday. 9to5Mac and other news sites provided details on the change, and people on Twitter posted screenshots of the 5G E indicator.

Of course, there is no 5G iPhone yet, and AT&T does not offer 5G mobile service for smartphones. AT&T's 5G E stands for 5G Evolution, but it's actually 4G LTE, albeit with advanced LTE features like 256 QAM, 4x4 MIMO, and three-way carrier aggregation.

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