Virgin Media O2 UK Reveals Plan to Switch Off 3G from 2025
Mobile operator O2 (Virgin Media / VMO2) has today become the final operator to reveal their plan for switching off the old 3G mobile (mobile broadband) network, which unlike their rivals is a process that won’t actually begin until 2025. The withdrawal will then occur in phases, with completion by the end of that same year.
The UK government and all major mobile operators have so far agreed to phase-out existing 2G and 3G signals by 2033 (here), which will free up radio spectrum bands so that they can be used to further improve the network coverage and mobile broadband speeds of more modern 4G and 5G networks. The switch-off will also reduce the operators’ costs and power consumption.
However, contrary to what you might think, 3G services will be the first to go because older 2G signals remain useful as a low-power fallback (they’ll be sticking around for a lot longer) and are still necessary for some rural areas, as well as for particular applications (e.g. many Smart Meters and other Internet of Things (IoT) / M2M services are dependent upon 2G).
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So far, most other network operators currently expect to have completely phased out 3G by the end of 2024, with Vodafone and EE (BT) having effectively already started the process.
3G Phase Out Plans by Operator
➤ Vodafone UK has technically already started to phase out 3G and aims to complete by December 2023.
➤ Three UK said they’ll be phasing out their 3G network service gradually over the next 2 years and switching it off by the end of 2024.
➤ EE (BT) will this year begin moving customers off 3G rather than switching the network off, but they aim to switch it off in early 2024.
The last operator to confirm their plans today is O2 (VMO2), which perhaps isn’t too surprising given that they’re heavily involved in Smart Meters across a big part of the UK. Nevertheless, 3G only accounts for less than 4% of mobile data traffic on the O2 network, but represents 11% of the company’s energy consumption.
Meanwhile, 4G and 5G together account for 96% of mobile network data traffic and 29% of energy consumption on O2’s infrastructure. This means that 3G uses 2.97 units of energy per unit of mobile traffic, while 4G and 5G together use 0.3 units of energy per unit of mobile traffic. Clearly, there are some big savings to be had from this transition.
Jeanie York, Chief Technology Officer at VMO2, said:
“3G was once an exciting new development for telecoms providers that brought new opportunities for customers. But as we continue to evolve our network to provide the best mobile connectivity, it is clear that switching off 3G and focusing our attention and investment on the faster, more reliable and more efficient 4G and 5G services is the right thing to do for our customers, our business and the environment.
We will begin to switch off 3G in 2025, but between now and then, we will be communicating directly with our customers to explain what this means for them and outline any steps they should take in the next 18 months. While most customers will need to take no action at all, we are committed to supporting everyone with this necessary transition.
As this switchover takes place, we will continue to invest heavily in maintaining, upgrading and expanding our 4G and 5G networks to ensure we’re providing the fast and reliable mobile connectivity that our customers depend on.”
The vast majority of existing customers won’t need to take any action during this switch off period, but VMO2 said they’re committed to helping those who may need additional support – for example, those who still use older devices and vulnerable users.
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The company will be contacting customers well in advance to ensure they are aware of these changes and will clearly outline the steps they need to take and their options, with support pages and trained agents on hand to help customers with this change. The operator will also work closely with consumer groups and charities, including Good Things Foundation, to draw on their expertise and experience to help manage this transition.
Take note that the changes will impact any dependent Mobile Virtual Network Operators (MVNO), so you won’t be able to escape it by switching to an MVNO on the same physical network, while rival networks will have already completed their transition.
However, despite the operator’s soothing words, the move will inevitably cause some data connectivity problems for anybody who still relies on a 3G-only device (rare). Most of those with a 3G handset (i.e. one that can’t do 4G or 5G) will find that it may continue to function, albeit only via basic 2G services (i.e. voice and very.. slow data). Anything that doesn’t fall back to 2G will, however, cease to function.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook and Linkedin.
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I am sure this will get the usual “typical O2 why are they so slow lol” responses but O2 have a lot more customers to support than Vodafone and as we’ve seen with Vodafone, there are a lot of issues with turning 3G off, leaving customers with EDGE only or No Service. I’d rather O2 took a bit longer and got it right the first time and anyhow it’s only a year after EE and Three.
Good job O2.
Hello Horsey. Still thumping the tub for O2 I see! 🙂
My business phone is on O2. What a mistake. I can barely get 3G at home, nevermind 4G. Luckily the contract will be up before this switch off. VM O2 just needs to die. Awful company.
All morons not checking coverage before they sign contract should die.
Whoa no need for the die comment dude chill
I doubt that any operator will leave a piece without coverage when 3g sites are decommissioned. They’ll probably add 4g ahead of switch off on the site.
@Ekim Coverage is only half of the story with VM02 from personal experience the signal is fine but the data is so slow its unusable. When virgin moved over to 02 they clearly didn’ expand the capacity at the same time, 02 has always been slow but the merger made it even worse
When it comes to business phones (corporate contracts), employees have little choice.
I mean I have O2 and it was fine for me a year ago. Now it barely works at all.
The biggest problem I have besides speed is that text messages like OTPs from banks often do not arrive. And when I moved here, I got PAYG SIMs for all the networks and settled on O2 as the most reliable one / best signal. Things change. Like three 5G. It was fast, now it’s not.
@ekim may I remind you that the coverage maps are computer models? So no, please do not victim blame the original post creator, because it’s possible that they thought the network would be better than this.
@anon I’m one of the Virgin Mobile migrants and I’ve never been on O2 directly, but when it was on Vodafone which uses the exact same cell towers, it was faster and more reliable.
@ekim
The coverage checker said excellent indoor coverage
I’m quite critical of O2, though this timeframe seems sound to me with the factors mentioned. Quite surprised how energy inefficient 3G is, no wonder why the others are trying to move on asap.
3G was the sector’s first real attempt at a true “mobile broadband” technology, and it’s now a VERY old technology at that. Processors and mobile network design has improved by an order of magnitude since then.
Are 2G turned off next?
Yes, I’d wager it’ll start happening over the next 5 years or so, dependent on how satellite can extend coverage across the isles.
2033 (it says it above, and in their press release).
I have several devices that work on O2s 2G network. Like my car’s GPS tracker.
Bear in mind that VMO2 have their 5G Standalone rollout planned for next year – purposefully one year earlier than their 3G switch-off date.
That gives them plenty of time to patch up coverage gaps that removing 3G may potentially create.
They also aren’t likely to remove their 2G until 2028 due to their smart meter contract.
Love them or hate them, VMO2 has clearly planned their network evolution thoroughly.
I’ll try them again in a couple of years then, because at the moment their network is easily the worst of the bunch.
Interesting. O2 has rebuild from scratch a pole/mast with cabinets in my town adding 5G to it in February. It is NSA, why they didn’t make it SA from the beginning?
@10BaseT My understanding is that the difference between 5G SA and NSA is mostly in the core, rather than the access network (the masts) — for now they’ll be connected to what’s largely a 4G core, but it’s likely that the masts are ready to run in 5G Standalone mode once O2 have the infra behind the scenes ready.
10BaseT you haven’t understood what Lauren said at all
@Anon I did, my impression is that you don’t understand it at all.
Where I live they upgraded the network to 5G recently but when I was using a 4G only device the service deteriorated badly.
Before the upgrade 4G always worked but now the 4G only device is frequently only getting 3G signal which breaks most things. Not sure why this is happening or it might just be a coincidence but it didn’t happen before the upgrade.
I’ve switched Voxi recently to see if the Vodafone network is any better.
When I switched to a 5G phone it did almost immediately become apparent to me that my theory that O2 were sacrificing 4G capacity in order to provide 5G signal was correct. Not that the 5G signal is much good!
@AndyK tell me you don’t know how 5G NSA works without telling me you don’t know how 5G NSA works
O2 are the only MNO that still supplies and supports femtocells (AKA O2 Boost Box), almost all of these are 3G only, I guess this also means the end of this service, but they are still selling them on the O2 website..
Wow this could mean GiffGaff users.. finally.. get VoLTE :-0
noting preventing giffgaff giving VoLTE or Wifi calling apart from themselves and o2
Considering my VoLTE doesn’t work despite being provisioned, this is going to be fun. The 2G network is going to be clogged up, same with the 4G network.
Also is it me or did everyone miss the fact that Virgin Mobile is no longer selling plans? Pretty sad considering Virgin was extremely competitive unlike O2 (my mum got a 15GB SIM for £7/mo a few months ago, and it’s literally 50GB now on O2, no provider can beat this, and my original plan was 2GB for £5/mo in August 2018 and it’s now unlimited for £6.79/mo on O2).
Many O2 staff don’t appear to know how to switch on VoLTE/WiFi calling properly, I had to request it 3 or 4 times over several months before I got someone who understood the process and then it instantly came to life.
I got my dad a sim only plan on 02 via virgin only £6 a month for 10gb (hardly uses 1-2gb per month) used to be on plusnet which was £8 for 4gb of data defo for value VM02 is the best main operator around hopefully speeds with improve with the roll out of 5G and re distribution of the 3G band
As late as they may be to shut off 3G and redistribute bandwidth, it’ll probably still be sooner than VM enable IPv6!
The Smart Meters nugget does worry me…
Either they can fall back onto something else that will remain available or there will have to be a massive rollout of new meters or 4G/5G modules.
Just cancelled O2 as airtime run out and they can’t handle it! Call me 10 times a day despite asking not to and blocking their number…
Poorest ever company I ever had anything to do with.
No 5G, no decent coverage at all….
Will utility Smart Meters be affected by this change ? Will towers be lost ?
And how will that square with their obligation to complete SM rollout by 2025 ?
And they were worries about Huawei screwing the mobile comms system ?
They didn’t think about any of it at all, no, they just threw darts at a board and came up with a year.
That was sarcasm just to clarify for those who aren’t so good at noticing it.