Will a 4G plan work on a 3G phone?

PapaLazaru · 29 Jun 2014 at 21:08

I am a little confused by this.

I want to upgrade my SIM only plan with Voda but my phone, a Nokia 520, only supports 3G, but their 4G plans cost the same as the 3G plans but come with more data.

Will the 4G plan just revert back to 3G?

RJC · 29 Jun 2014 at 21:10

Yes

The sim will work to what the phone uses, I have on the odd occasion disabled 4g on my phone.

PapaLazaru · 29 Jun 2014 at 21:12

Ah sweet. I know Voda have a bad rep but I have been with them for years and can upgrade my plan to a 4G service for the same cost but double my data allowance.

It is a bit sneaky as they do not offer this on my upgrade page so had to do a bit of searching to find the deal.

RJC · 29 Jun 2014 at 21:16

I left Vodafone for Tesco as they did not offer me a great deal 6 months ago, I left and went with Tesco for £5 less a month and included 4g at no extra cost but most carriers are doing this now.

Muy sister managed to get a good deal and my Dad is now with them on the sim only deal for £16 a month.

PapaLazaru · 29 Jun 2014 at 21:20

Yeah it is a SIM only deal on 4G with 1GB of data (I was on 500mg) with unlimited calls and texts for only 50p a month more than what I was paying!

Hxc · 29 Jun 2014 at 21:27

Vodafone have a rather desperate retentions department, 50% off sim only plans is not uncommon.

Resident · 30 Jun 2014 at 08:23

PapaLazaru said:
Yeah it is a SIM only deal on 4G with 1GB of data (I was on 500mg) with unlimited calls and texts for only 50p a month more than what I was paying!

Just be aware that particular deal ends today.

4G plans cover all data bands in terms of being able to use your data and your phone will always attempt to connect to the best possible data transfer protocol. In your case that will be 3G at maximum.

Terminal_Boy · 30 Jun 2014 at 08:45

The only problem is that all the UK networks are moving the majority of their data capacity to their 4G systems and leaving 3G to handle voice.

O2 is a great example of this with reasonable data speeds on their 4G system, but you could probably receive data via post-it notes stapled to hedgehogs faster than on their 3G links.

Myshra · 30 Jun 2014 at 09:15

Is that your speculation or fact? What you described is contrary to all network designs right now (this is ignoring the fact that the same capacity for a site is usually linked to both the 3G and 4G parts of a cell without going into evolve packet core). Your experience is more likely a result of radio capacity which is very different.