Its stock is publicly traded, but Telephone and Data Systems Inc. owns a controlling stake (83% economic and 96% voting power).

United States Cellular was founded as a subsidiary of Telephone and Data Systems Inc.[3] (TDS) and incorporated on December 23, 1983. began operations in Knoxville, Tennessee (June), and Tulsa, Oklahoma (August).

The company went public in 1988 where United States Cellular adopted USM as its ticker symbol on the American Stock Exchange.

In January 2003, U.S. Cellular acquired naming rights to the baseball stadium used by the Chicago White Sox.

In October 2008, U.S. Cellular launched Mobile Broadband, a service enabling customers to access data on its cell phones 10 times faster than before.

It brought DSL-like service and capabilities to customers through EVDO (Evolution-Data Optimized) technology, commonly referred to as 3G.

While UScellular would retain 70% of its wireless spectrum and cell sites under the deal, T-Mobile would also be able to lease more than 2,000 towers from the company.

[19] In December 2019, the FCC found U.S. Cellular shared misinformation about its 4G LTE coverage, exaggerating performance by as much as 38% and only managing to reach the federally mandated minimum speeds 45% of the time.

The company launched its first phone with support, the Samsung Galaxy S20, as well as coverage maps for its first commercial 5G network in both urban and rural parts of Iowa and Wisconsin in February 2020.

The sonic logo, tag, audio mnemonic was produced by Musikvergnuegen and written by Walter Werzowa from the Austrian 1980s sampling band Edelweiss.