Newest addition to T-Mobile, Video calling

When I think about the major phone carriers in today’s world, the four that come to mind are Verizon, T-Mobile, AT&T and Sprint. All of these major phone carriers offer about the same services but in different quality. According to the consumer reports T-Mobile’s rise in 2014 is largely due to a bump in perceived value by customers. T-mobile’s overall customer satisfaction puts them on top, being considered the best carrier with voice, data and text. Their aggressive uncarrier strategy, which separates the purchase of your phone with the payment of your plan seem to have been a success for them. T-Mobile has made a turn around in the way consumers perceive their image. They keep on making innovative changes that will continue to give them a lead from other carriers.

Just this week T-mobile released a new feature that is yet to come out for Android phones. If you are a Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge+ and Samsung Galaxy Note 5, starting now you will be able to have access to video calling embedded on your phone. While the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge will see the addition arrive in the next week. This is a great new technology that only T-Mobile is offering to their Samsung users. T-Mobile is hoping that with this addition they will have an advantage over all carriers and hopefully create a bigger engagement between their users.

Even though this is a great addition to their services offered, here are a couple reasons why this idea may not take the shift T-Mobile is expecting:

Never ending competition with the Apple iPhone.

I think it’s safe to say that consumers have a clear picture as to if they are an Android or iPhone user. Most people have their mind set on the operating system that they prefer. Will this away an Apple user to change over? Maybe, now that they offer more of the same features.

A lot of apps already offer similar services.

Yes, there are apps like Skype, Facebook Messenger, Google Hangouts and more, as well as built-in apps like Apple’s FaceTime that already offer video calling. But what T-mobile wants is to basically offer Android device owners something that feels more native to the user experience, in order to better compete with things like Apple’s FaceTime. There is no need to search out and download another additional apps, with this service you have video calling right on your finger tips to use instantly.

The way it works is video calling connects over LTE and Wi-Fi, and can move seamlessly between the two as T-Mobile’s HD Video calls do. The feature will also seamlessly switch over to a voice call when a user moves to a slower connection. And if they return to an LTE or Wi-Fi connection, they can then enable a video call again with a tap, T-Mobile claims. If a user is able to have video calling it will indicate you on your phonebook with a camera icon next to the person’s name.

It will be interesting to test out this new technology and compare it to what is already out in the market. I hope that consumers are happy with this new addition to their phones. By the end of the year T-Mobile hopes to have come out with a total of seven phones that will have video calling. T-Mobile will continue to surprise us with more innovations that will continue to make their customers happy.