Bharti Airtel, which was doing pilot testing in some cities, is expected to launch its voice over LTE (VoLTE) service in India today. In Delhi, the telecom has scheduled an event and has sent media invites for the same.
A few handsets have already started receiving Airtel carrier update with support for VoLTE technology. Apple India support page also lists support for Airtel VoLTE in India for iPhone 6 and above.
VoLTE allows an operator to offer both voice and data without switching between bands, with voice being just another application that rides on an LTE data network. Currently, telecom company offers to call on the legacy circuit-switch technology.
According to Ericsson, India’s VoLTE user base will reach 370 million by 2022, while the global base is set to reach 4.6 billion during the same period.
Besides Vodafone India is also undergoing its VoLTE and plans to launch services shortly. While Vodafone is leading the deployment of VoLTE in Europe.
While Mukesh Ambani’s owned Jio has launched its VoLTE service last year and is now running successfully with over 11.2 crores subscribers.