Galaxy S8 gets Telstra tick of approval for regional 4G
The Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus are not only the fastest phones available on Telstra, but they'll also fly if you're in regional Australia.
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The Samsung Galaxy S8.
The Samsung Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus are already the fastest phones currently available on Telstra's network, but now that prestige extends all the way out into the bush.
Telstra has today confirmed that Samsung 's two new flagship devices are the first to be certified under the telco's new 4G Blue Tick rating system.
City dwellers won't necessarily care about a blue tick, unless it's on their Twitter profile. But it's a big deal for regional Australians, because it guarantees a device has the capability to deliver coverage outside big towns and cities.
The system is not new -- the Blue Tick has been around for 10 years -- but the previous system only rated phones for their 3G coverage, regardless of whether they worked on 4G or not. The new 4G Blue Tick now guarantees 4GX coverage in regional areas.
With more devices and telcos move to delivering voice calls over 4G LTE connections (known as Voice over LTE, or VoLTE), the deal is getting better.
The rating comes after "rigorous" testing in Telstra's labs and in regional areas. Telstra's director of device management Andrew Volard said testing was done with "Australia's unique conditions in mind" to deliver data speeds "among the fastest in the world" on the GS8 and GS8+.
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