Aerial Communications Inc.; a regional network operator in the Columbus, Houston, Kansas City, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Pittsburgh, and Tampa-St. Petersburg-Orlando markets; was acquired on May 4, 2000.

While the new company was still the fourth-largest carrier in the United States (at the time), the acquisition gave T-Mobile access to more spectrum and financial resources to maintain competitiveness and expand its LTE network.

[27] The "Un-carrier" strategy has since been expanded to encompass other value-added services, such as a plan add-on allowing phone trade-ins for early upgrades twice per year,[28] carrying over unused data allotments for up to a year,[29] and zero-rating of selected music and video services (the latter locked to "DVD quality") over the mobile network,[30][31] These moves came as part of an effort under new CEO John Legere to help revitalize the business as it improves its network quality.

[32] On June 28, 2013, T-Mobile agreed to buy wireless spectrum for the Mississippi Valley region from its competitor U.S. Cellular for around $308 million, allowing it to expand its 4G network across 29 more markets.

Valued at $4.4 billion, the deal includes UScellular's customer base of 4 million users, approximately 30% of spectrum assets, and the rights to more than 2,000 towers.

On March 26, 2013, T-Mobile began rolling out LTE in 7 markets: Baltimore, San Jose, Washington, D.C., Phoenix, Las Vegas, Kansas City, and Houston.

[68] On October 27, 2015, T-Mobile announced in its Q3 2015 earnings call that they covered over 300 million people with LTE, reaching their 2015 end of year goal months ahead of schedule.

[70] In September 2016, T-Mobile launched 4x4 MIMO and 3 channel carrier aggregation allowing theoretical speeds of 400 Mbit/s, and also announced that the company's LTE network reaches over 312 million potential subscribers.

[78] On June 25, 2018, T-Mobile and Nokia completed their first bi-directional 5G NR transmission in the 28 GHz frequency compliant with 3GPP 5G standards, showing a big step forward to building a nationwide 5G Network.

[106] In August 2022, T-Mobile and SpaceX announced a partnership called Coverage Above and Beyond where the latter's satellites would provide connections for cellphones throughout the US, even in remote areas with no existing service.

T-Mobile also included other messaging apps (iMessage, Google Hangouts, WhatsApp and Viber) in addition to SMS texting being provided since September 2014.

[158][71][159] The plan has been criticized by the Electronic Frontier Foundation and others for potentially violating net neutrality rules and making previously included features paid extras.

[160][161][162] In August 2018, T-Mobile introduced the ONE Plus family plan, which allows HD streaming and adds 20 GB of mobile hotspot at 4G LTE speeds, and Name ID.

T-Mobile stated that there are a small handful of users who abuse the tethering plan by altering device software and/or the use of an Android app that masks T-Mobile's ability monitoring whether data is on-smartphone, or through smartphone mobile hotspot (tethering) by mimicking all data as on-smartphone use, with some customers abusing the service by using as much as 2 TB per month, causing speed issues for all other customers.

[168] Ultra Mobile is a prepaid MVNO that offers limited and unlimited plans that include international calling and texting to select countries.

On December 13, 2017, T-Mobile US announced its intent to acquire the IPTV provider Layer3 TV, which operates in Chicago and Washington, as the basis of its own subscription television service initially planned to launch in 2018.

[172][173][174][175][176] On April 10, 2019, T-Mobile officially announced the re-branding and re-launch of Layer3 TV as TVision Home[177] The service mirrors the hardware, packaging, and pricing models of other linear television providers.

[4] In 2011, J. D. Power and Associates stated that T-Mobile retail stores achieved the highest ratings among major wireless carriers for customer satisfaction for the fourth consecutive year, performing particularly well in price and promotions.

Through a spokesman, the company stated, "Despite the Communication Workers of America's periodic organizing efforts for more than nine years, no group of T-Mobile employees has ever chosen to be represented by a union.

[219] In a letter, dated September 21, 2010, fifteen Californian Members of Congress urged Obermann to take action and implement fair and equitable labor relations.

"[citation needed] On December 9, 2009, the non-profit organization American Rights at Work published a report written by Prof. John Logan, Director of Labor Studies at San Francisco State University, titled "Lowering the Bar or Setting the Standard?

[clarification needed][221] On September 2, 2010, Human Rights Watch released a report written by Lance Compa titled "A Strange Case: Violations of Workers' Freedom of Association in the United States by European Multinational Corporations".

But HRW found that "T-Mobile USA's harsh opposition to workers' freedom of association in the United States betrays Deutsche Telekom's purported commitment to social responsibility, impedes constructive dialogue with employee representatives, and in several cases, has violated ILO and OECD labor and human rights standards".

[241] Reports indicated that for about a year Jacobsen had access to customer passwords, e-mail, address books, Social Security numbers, birth dates, and Sidekick photos.

[244] On June 6, 2009, a message posted from an email account "pwnmobile_at_Safe-mail.net" to the Full Disclosure mailing list claimed that the company's network had been breached and showed sample data.

[251] According to T-Mobile's privacy policy highlights, "Retention and Disposal", information is retained for as long as there is business or tax need or as applicable laws, regulations, or government orders require.

T-Mobile notes that it disposes of Personal Information, uses reasonable procedures designed to erase or render it unreadable (for example, shredding documents and wiping electronic media).

[252] In 2010, the Department of Justice (DOJ) released a document entitled, "Retention Periods of Major Cellular Providers," to advise law enforcement agents seeking to obtain cell phone records.

[254] On August 16, 2021, T-Mobile confirmed that the company had been subject to a data breach but declined to say whether any customers' personal information was accessed or how widespread the damage was.

The company acknowledged the breach after hackers told Vice the day prior that they were selling "full customer info" obtained from T-Mobile servers.