In a 2015 book, Losing the Signal: The Untold Story Behind the Extraordinary Rise and Spectacular Fall of BlackBerry, the authors argued that the Storm was the single biggest disaster in smartphone history.

[8] The BlackBerry Storm was available through Vodafone in the UK, Germany, France (SFR), Italy, Ireland, Australia, South Africa (Vodacom), The Netherlands and India;[9] Verizon Wireless in the United States; Telus, Bell, and SaskTel in Canada, on Iusacell in Mexico,[10] and on lime and Digicel in parts the Caribbean.

This is because GSM carriers in North America, namely AT&T, T-Mobile, Rogers and Fido, do not operate on the same frequency bands for 3G as the rest of the world.

If the BlackBerry Storm is used in Europe, Africa, Asia, Oceania or Brazil, HSDPA wireless data speed can be achieved, provided that the local GSM network supports it.

This is because GSM carriers in North America, namely AT&T, T-Mobile, Rogers and Fido do not operate on the same frequency bands for 3G as the rest of the world.

If BlackBerry Storm is used in Europe, Africa, Asia, Oceania or Brazil, HSDPA wireless data speed can be achieved, provided that the local GSM network supports it.

Many gadget reviewers, including Bonnie Cha of CNET,[17] Joshua Topolsky of Engadget[18] and Sascha Segan from PC Magazine,[19] noted the Storm's much-improved web browser and impressive call quality, while also deeming the SurePress touchscreen difficult to learn and a hindrance to fast typing.

A number of reviewers also ran into multiple software glitches during their testing, such as lockups, sluggish performance and refusal to switch orientation.

[20] The lack of Wi-Fi support also irked a few reviewers, but as noted by Jeff Rauschert of MLive, Verizon's wireless network somewhat makes up for this.

[21] David Haskin of the Reseller News noted that BlackBerry's major business features, such as enterprise e-mail integration and Microsoft Office document editing capabilities, were on par with BlackBerry's previous offerings, noting that these features would likely make the Storm more popular with the business crowd.