Earlier today, Andy Rubin and his new company, Essential, officially took the wraps off their first flagship smartphone, aptly known as the Essential Phone. Essential provided plenty of details regarding the handset, including the type of radios it would have under its titanium and ceramic chassis. At the time we knew that, technically, the Essential Phone does indeed support the networks of every major wireless carrier in the United States, but the carriers themselves were quiet on that front. That has changed, though, with most of the largest wireless carriers in the United States –Verizon Wireless, Sprint, and T-Mobile– all confirming that they will indeed support the Essential Phone when it launches. As noted by The Verge, Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint have all responded, but not everyone appears to be pleased with the upcoming launch. Verizon, specifically, had this to say: Meanwhile, T-Mobile is happy to see the Essential Phone landing on the market, and is equally just as happy to host it on its network through its own BYOD program. However, some features on the carrier side may not work: And Sprint had this to say: AT&T hadn’t responded at the time of this publication. However, there’s no real reason to expect at this point that the Essential Phone won’t support the Big Blue network. It doesn’t look like any of the major wireless carriers have plans to fully support the device (as in, selling it directly), but that probably has more to do with the fact that Essential itself isn’t built to mass produce the handset on that kind of scale. So, do you plan on picking up the Essential Phone when it launches (which is in June, by the way).
