Sprint CTO John Saw, in a recent blog post, described 2018 as a “banner year” for the carrier, which is moving toward a merger with T-Mobile US pending further regulatory reviews, but still executing on its own network improvement plan. Sprint invested around $5 billion in its network this year.

“We’re ending this year with our biggest LTE data coverage footprint, LTE Advanced nationwide which is up to 2X faster than before on capable devices, and gigabit class LTE performance in more than 270 cities,” Saw wrote. “We continue to deploy our innovative and traditional technology to take advantage of our spectrum holdings as we invest in our network and prepare for the launch of 5G.”

Saw broke out some of the major network improvements undertaken in 2018:

• “Tens of thousands of macro site upgrades” enabling support for Sprint’s 800 MHz, PCS and 2.5 GHz spectrum, with 2.5 GHz supported at more than 70% of sites.
• More than 25,000 small cells in the field and 275,000 Magic Boxes being used by consumer and business customers.
• “Hundreds of massive MIMO radios deployed, boosting speed and capacity in high-traffic areas with LTE Advanced service today and ready for 5G next year.”

To the 5G piece, Sprint plans to launch next year in Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Kansas City, Los Angeles, New York City, Phoenix and Washington, D.C. The carrier has already announced plans for compatible handsets from LG and Samsung, and a hot spot from HTC.