Voice over LTE has now been launched on a fifth of all commercial 4G networks, new research has claimed.
The VoLTE Service Launches Worldwide report from Hadden Telecoms said 123 LTE or LTE-Advanced networks offer the service to customers with compatible handsets across 60 countries.
It claimed an additional 74 operators were planning, deploying or trialling voice over LTE technology in their networks.
Alan Hadden, former President of the Global mobile Suppliers Association and Director of Hadden Telecoms, said: “VoLTE technology delivers not only an enhanced voice calling experience for users with compatible devices, but also underpins other new and valued services including video calling (ViLTE) and WiFi Calling (VoWiFi).”
Last month, Ericsson signalled it was looking to broaden the reach of voice over LTE with the addition of the technology to LTE-M deployments. This would allow IoT devices to support voice as well as data.
Earlier in July, the Swedish vendor held a demonstration with Qualcomm on China Unicom’s network, showing how these services would work in practice.
Telia Sweden and Three Denmark became the latest operator’s to launch VoLTE services in April and March respectively.