When you take into account the build quality, design, hardware features and, of course, mobile operating system, the iPhone is our pick for the world’s greatest smartphone product line. But it’s not no. 1 in everything — as speed tests make clear.

In download speed tests carried out by Ookla LLC, the company behind the Speedtest app and website, the current-generation iPhones lag behind the top smartphones made by both Samsung and Google. This means slower website loading, movies starting more quickly, and higher quality video calls.

AT&T promised to bring the next generation of cellular wireless technology to a dozen cities before the end of this year. It just hasn’t revealed which ones yet.

The carrier started the teasing process a few months ago, announcing that Atlanta, Dallas and Waco, Texas, will get mobile 5G.

The Philadelphia Phillies and Aramark started a pilot program that lets fans order beer from their seats using an iPhone.

The service makes use of Apple Business Chat, a service that launched this spring designed to let customers send messages to companies without strings attached.

Sprint has renamed and changed some of the features of its unlimited data plan. iPhone users now have a choice between paying more or getting less.  

It’s not all bad news. There’s 50 percent more tethering data in a new top-tier plan, and the TIDAL music streaming service has been added.

HTC, once among Apple’s top rivals in the smartphone market, is laying off a quarter of its workforce. This is just the latest step in the slow collapse of the Taiwanese company.

This isn’t the result of some terrible misstep. There just doesn’t appear to be room in the current phone market for anyone but Apple, Samsung, and China-based phone-makers.

The advertising regulatory body in the UK ruled that Apple can say that the  iPhone X takes “studio-quality portraits.”

An ad for this smartphone promised “Radically new cameras with Portrait Lighting. Studio-quality portraits. Without the studio.” However, this brought two complaints to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA).

4G LTE will soon be supplanted by something better, stronger, and faster. But before 5G can be rolled out, it had to pass an important hurdle: a final design needed to be agreed apron.

The 3GPP agreed on a standard this week, opening the way to significantly faster browsing and downloads.

Verizon just created a new top tier to its unlimited data plans. It was designed for “super users who want the most,” according to the carrier.

The Above Unlimited plan offers 75GB of unthrottled 4G LTE data, and 20GB of unthrottled hotspot data, for $95 a month.

The 2018 iPhone models are rumored to have larger screens, better processors, and other enhancements. But there’s one feature that, even though we’ve heard nothing about it, we should strongly hope is in Apple’s next smartphones: 4×4 MIMO.

This is a cellular wireless data technology that gives the Samsung Galaxy S9 a substantial speed advantage over the iPhone X.

New carriers are now available to Apple Watch Series 3 owners with LTE connectivity. Both C-Spire and U.S. Cellular are offering Apple’s latest smartwatch — and one has a stellar deal that will save you big bucks.