3G on iPhone 12

And you are totally missing the point. The switches that appear in Setting/Cellular (or Settings/Mobile Data in some countries) are NOT placed there by Apple; they are contained in the Carrier Settings file that the carrier installs when you connect to their network. So if you don’t have an option to switch to 3G it is because your carrier doesn’t want you to have that option. Apple has no control over that feature.

Your iPhone 12 supports 3G and 2G; it just doesn’t have a switch to force it to use these obsolete network protocols. But if there is no 4G or 5G available it will use 3G. Most carriers are disabling their 3G networks to allow the bandwidth to be used for 4G (LTE). In the US Verizon will be shutting down their 3G network in about 3 weeks. AT&T in about a year.

For VoLTE your phone will use it automatically wherever it is available. You don’t need to explicitly turn it on anymore.

Whether or not you can pick up a 2nd call is a network feature that has nothing to do with the phone.

Abrartahli wrote:

i have experience with my old phone x and 11 if I put my phone VoLTE off we don’t have this issue,now in iPhone 12 pro apple didn’t have this option that’s why its making big issue,my all working college have same problem then I told them turn off VoLTE off they did and issue resolved.it’s not carrier issue it’s apple issue

Please read what I wrote. The switches that select networks are installed on your phone by your carrier, not by Apple. It’s part of the Carrier Settings file that is installed when you activate a phone on a mobile network. If there is no 3G switch it is because the CARRIER DID NOT INSTALL IT; Apple has no control over what the carrier installs on your phone.

Thus, IT IS NOT AN APPLE ISSUE! The iPhone 12 supports 2g, 3g, 4g and 5g. And if there is no 4g or 5g service available it will revert to 3g. You just can’t force it to because your network operator doesn’t want you using 3g. Most networks will be eliminating 3g completely in the next year or so (here in the US Verizon is shutting down theirs at the end of this year (2020). Even before the official shutdown carriers are switching many towers from 3g to 4g to improve 4g coverage. For every 3g channel on a tower there is one less 4g channel available for that location.

I've spent over a month talking to T-Mobile about this. They claim everything is fine on their end and it's not them. Unfortunately you can't even debug this as they've removed anything slower from LTE from their settings (5G On, 5G Auto, LTE are the options). I have to drive to a 3G area to see if their last "fix" corrected it. I'm starting to think that T-Mobile have disabled the iPhone 12s from using 3g.

You will find this is the case with all 5G phones its also the same with Samsung phones too. for example: I can switch to '3G only' or even '2G only' on my Galaxy S7 Edge, but there is no option to do that on Samsung 5G phones! or with other brand for that matter. The issue is related to your sim/carrier as another member correctly stated. you could try another network but I think you will find its the same scenario with every modern sim card. but here is something everyone should be aware of in the Uk: the networks plan to switch the 3G infrastructure off before 2G networks! and although that may sound strange this is why: 2G is being retained because it offers far better coverage than 3G and is required for users of 2G only 'dumbphones' often used by the older people. at present the operators have set no firm date for the 3G switch off, but it will happen. I have previously worked in the mobile industry and still follow it closely.

So after a month of trying to get a new SIM card it finally arrived. And like magic, 3G is not working for me. I’m surprised that the eSim still had those issues, but at least data on 3G works one more time. I can’t select 3G directly, but my phone is no longer useless when I’m in non LTE areas.

This is definitely an Apple GUI issue.

The carrier will provide a list of available frequencies/bands. As per the many replies, if when there is no 4G or 5G the phone reverts to 3G, this is the proof.

The problem appears to be that Apple, in their infinite wisdom, decided the only preference order was the G number in reverse and the only option you have is to disable 5G. But this is far from what you face in real life.

A very likely scenario is that you are at home in a poor "new technology" reception area where you really need good voice and couldn't care less about data as you are using your home WiFi. The user should have the option to influence preference and be able to force the phone to 3G. Otherwise you end up connected to half a bar of intermittent 4G signal with very poor voice and possibly no data while you are sitting on top of a 3G tower that is capable of providing crystal clear voice reception that you really care about.

Go to Settings/Cellular (Settings/Mobile Data in some regions). There are switches for enabling 5G and 4G, and perhaps an Auto setting. These switches are placed there by the carrier using the carrier settings file.

As I said in my previous reply from a few months ago, it’s how technology goes, just like how the iPhone 5 supported LTE and you can no longer select edge, as with the iPhone 4s, you can select 3G/edge. it will automatically switch from 5G to LTE/4G/3G/edge/GPRS, what’s different this time is that the iPhone 12 does not support threeG EVDO/ 1XRTT on CDMA networks when a Sim card supports 5G/ VOLTE, if you look at previous iPhone models, the iPhone 4s has an enable 3G icon in settings greater than cellular data options, and from iPhone 5 to iPhone 11 you can go to settings cellular cellular data options and there’s an icon for enable LTE, and the iPhone 12 has an icon of 5G, 5G auto and LTE, I assume that the unreleased new iPhones with 6G will only have options to enable 5G or 6G. how technology goes, if you look at some android phones that support 4G, you usually only have options to enable 3G, but I think new android phones supporting 5G may no longer have options to use 3G.

I know that certain carriers have specific carrier settings that allows the user to choose whatever option The user want.

Yes, sign up and become a developer and you can see how the carrier settings file interacts with iOS. Or switch to a carrier that has no affiliation with Apple and you set do all the editing on the APNs that you want to including changing which bands are available. Or call your carrier and get someone high enough in the chain to explain to you what is in their current version (there is a reason it has the name of the carrier and the version number). Apple cannot change what is in the carrier file without the permission of the carrier.

As far as which signal it chooses to select that has absolutely nothing to do with Apple, that is embedded in the firmware of the radio chip which works with the SIM to determine which band/frequency to use. Apple cannot rewrite the firmware on the IC which communicates directly with the SIM. And just because a signal has more bars (really an approximation) that does not mean it is necessarily the best signal to utilize, there are many factors involved. If you are in an area where the phone has trouble selecting you need to notify the carrier so they can work on it. AT&T has a Mark the Spot app that does this.

Hello there,

I have the same exact issue. I live in France, and where I work, 4G even though available does not get Data and I am not able to surg the web. It only works when I force manually my phonet to switch to 3G only. But the latest version, I cannot select 3G anymore and I basicly cannot use the internet while at my workplace.

It really happened after the iOS update. My friend with the same phone (Iphone 12 pro) has iOS 14.2.1 and he can still select the 3G only option under cellular settings. He does not want to upgrade the firmware.

Apple, please help us!!!!!

Hello,

my friend is my co worker and he has the same carrier. We use to have the same settings (3G only) because of the issue in the location we work (only 3G works there) . The day I upgraded the iOS version I lost that setting. And because of that he did not upgrade the firmware. I will check the carrier version on his phone but it really has to do with my upgrading.

The only option to have options is to never upgrade your software and firmware that way in the future you wont have that much restrictions if i have not been upgraded my ios from ios 14.2. now i will be happy customer not frustrated today my phone battery last very little and i am really dissapointed i need either to buy iphone 12 pro max which is huge or to wait for firmware fix which can happen never... ot to switch to something else..

Same phone iphone 12 mini

ios 14..2 - There is a 3g option , same phone iphone 12 mini ios 14.5.1 3g option removed same carrier so its not carrier fault simply apple provided big restriction in order to sale more batteries and more phones... Marketing..

here i am showing 2 pictures

SAME sim card

2 different firmwares 2 iphones...

one of them have 3g/4g other one have only 4g lte /5g... after the upgrade different models of iphones .

IF I upgrade phone who still have 3g to the latest firmware it will loose that option as well.. apple rulez.

You apparently get lost easily. All series 12 iPhones support 3G at the current time and will connect to it automatically if that is the best signal available (most bars does not automatically equate to best signal).

The carriers are not block the signal and very few are still even using 2G. They may limit the ability to optionally pick to only used 3G. It is there as a fallback but you can't select to ONLY use 3G as the carrier does not offer that APN. Many do this because as they've added capabilities for 4G and 5G they have cut back on their 3G support and it wouldn't take that large of a number of people locked to it to completely make the band inoperable.

And yes, if you go into an area that only has 3G your iPhone 12 will connect as #G if the roaming is supported.

The iPhone 12 series supports 3G as a fallback. As others in this thread have confirmed, the phone works on 3G if there is no LTE or 5G network it can connect to. The carrier just doesn’t provide a way to select it intentionally.

I remember 3G; it was terrible. 1 bar of LTE still provided much faster data than 5 bars of 3G on my iPhone 7. My current iPhone XR does not provide 3G as an option; the only choice is between 4G and VoLTE for voice; there is no switch to select anything else for data. I know that it will occasionally connect to 3G, but it’s very rare. And when it does the speed drops to dial-up levels (under 1Mbps). LTE with 1 bar still provides 5-10 Mbps, and with 5 bars I routinely get 40 mbps or higher (i’ve seen as high as 90 mbps).