Finally the iPhone 4 is Officially Coming to Verizon

At around 11:06am EST today Verizon Wireless finally let the cat out of the bag and announced their long rumored partnership with Apple to bring the iPhone 4 to their network. It will be available in early February 10, 2011 and according the announcement it has been in testing for a year. The hardware appears to have all the same specs - Retina display, 5 megapixel camera, Facetime, A4 chip, HD video, etc..

The device is a 3G device, just like the current iPhone 4. The pricing is the same as the current version - $199 for 16GB and $299 for 32GB. There was mention that they redesigned the antenna in this version, and it appears that it is equipped with a CDMA only radio (no dual GSM worldphone which was rumored). There was a rumor during the announcement that there may be a white iPhone available, but that appears to be false. As a CDMA device, there is no ability to talk on the phone while also accessing the data network. It will have mobile WiFi hotspot capability and this has been confirmed in the devices settings. Other than that feature, and the CDMA only radio, this device has all the same specs of the current iPhone 4. Not data pricing was discussed, but Verizon will require a data plan as part of the deal, which is not different from AT&T.

Availability will be February 10, but there will be the option for some existing Verizon Wireless customers to pre-order a week early.

I will update this article as more details become available, because even though the spokesperson assured us that they have beefed up their network to handle the increased iPhone traffic, but their website has now locked up from just people following the announcement.

Update:

Engadget posted a couple of pictures that highlight the couple of differences with the GSM iPhone 4. First, you can see that the antenna has clearly been redesigned.



Second, you see the mobile WiFi Hotspot feature is now in the settings. Verizon confirmed that this feature will be part of the plan and not an additional charge like AT&T's tethering. But I believe that if you get a phone call during a hotspot session, it will kill the session. Hopefully there is a way to disable the phone if you need to do something significant over the hotspot.