Not AT&T Or Verizon: This Brand Tops JD Power's 2026 Wireless Carrier Satisfaction Study

If there's one thing people want in our overly technological age, it's a wireless service provider that they like. These companies should be able to provide high-quality service for a good price, are easy to do business with, and can solve problems efficiently if they come up. JD Power surveyed over 57,000 wireless customers about their experiences with their service providers in a recent study that covers all of these topics and more, including digital tools and offerings of products and services. Among the major mobile network operators, there was one clear winner: T-Mobile.

Whether customers had prepaid or postpaid wireless service, T-Mobile crushed the likes of Verizon and AT&T in both scenarios. Based on a 1,000-point scale, T-Mobile scored a 637 for prepaid service, beating Verizon and AT&T by 22 and 23 points, respectively. The difference was even more stark with those with postpaid service. T-Mobile earned 636 points. Meanwhile, Verizon got 606 points, and AT&T brought up the rear with 596, the only sub-600 point-getter of any network operator.

JD Power performs these studies every six months, and these numbers were all up from the previous study, even if the gains were occasionally slight. T-Mobile's pre- and postpaid scores were seven and six points higher, respectively, than six months ago. The company also topped both rankings from the study done one year ago. In none of these studies has Verizon or AT&T come close to surpassing T-Mobile. Importantly, these are the findings for the mobile network providers that have their own cellular infrastructure. There are also mobile virtual network operators to consider as well.

Mobile virtual network operators are an incredibly popular option for people to get their wireless service, and based on these findings by JD Power, they generally provide service that customers are more fond of than even T-Mobile, the top-rated major provider. In some cases, those satisfaction scores aren't just higher, but they truly crush the competition.

For those with prepaid service, Mint Mobile tops JD Power's survey. This is thanks to a score of 711 points out of 1,000. As a reminder, T-Mobile topped this segment for major providers with just 637 points. Ironically, Mint Mobile is one of the carriers owned by T-Mobile, so it's good that the customer satisfaction stretches out to its other brands. Mint Mobile beats out Visible by Verizon by just three points, so it was a tight race there. Both Cricket and Straight Talk Wireless earned 652 points for joint third place.

In the case of postpaid virtual network operators, we have the carrier with the highest satisfaction point score of any in the survey, Consumer Cellular. It earned a whopping 720-point score from customers, blasting past second-place finisher Google Fi Wireless by 47 points. While not owned by a major provider like Mint Mobile is, Consumer Cellular does use both AT&T and T-Mobile networks for its service, giving people quite the broad map for wireless usage. Google Fi Wireless may be a distant second place, but it also managed to finish 46 points ahead of Spectrum Mobile in third place. No other category comes close to being this definitive a ranking.

Across the board, JD Power saw increases in customer satisfaction for things like interactions with people and the value of the service for what people pay for it. There was also an increase in overall points for problem or complaint resolutions. There's some important nuance to that increase, though, because one place where the study saw a lot of mixed results was with people's interactions with AI assistants.

It's no secret that AI assistants have dramatically impacted the entire customer service ecosystem, whether we're talking about online chatbots or AI assistants over the phone. Speaking to a real person about an issue now requires a good deal of hoop jumping, and customers have certainly felt that here. 45% of all customer interactions with their mobile network provider involved interacting with an AI assistant, and when communicating with one, it was only able to resolve the customer's issue 48% of the time. If it could resolve the issue, that boosted the overall satisfaction score by 83 points, but on average, that happened less than half of the time. Customer satisfaction from those who contacted their provider and spoke to a person was 20 points higher than if they had talked to an AI assistant.

Importantly, the study found that the AI was less likely to handle complex problems, though it was sufficient with the simpler ones. Naturally, a person would be less satisfied with their experience if they spent a lot of time with an AI that couldn't resolve their issue, only to then be sent to a real customer representative who could do it all along.