After launching Voice over LTE (VoLTE) services in India starting from Mumbai last month, Airtel has launched VoLTE services across Rest of Maharashtra & Goa. This lets Airtel customers enjoy HD quality voice calls along with faster call set up time compared to normal voice calls on their VoLTE-compatible 4G handsets.
Earlier this year Airtel launched 4G services in the 1800 MHz (Band 3) spectrum band using FDD-LTE technology in the circle.
Airtel promises seamless connectivity and in the case of non-availability of 4G, Airtel VoLTE calls will automatically fall back on 3G/2G network, said the company. It will also allow customers to continue with their data sessions at 4G speeds while the call is in progress.
Airtel says that customers with Dual-SIM handsets should insert their Airtel SIM in SIM slot 1 and network mode should be set as “4G/3G/2G (Auto)” for VoLTE to work properly. It lists only few devices on their website airtel.in/volte, and the company says that the handset manufacturer need to upgrade the smartphone’s software to support Airtel VoLTE, even though there are hundreds of 4G smartphones in the market with VoLTE support.
Airtel already said that it plans to roll out VoLTE across the country over the next few months without any time frame.
Commenting on the launch, Rohit Marwha, Chief Executive Officer – Maharashtra & Goa, Bharti Airtel said:
We are delighted to launch VoLTE and add yet another service to our portfolio enabling customers to make the most of their mobile phone experience on our world-class 4G network across Maharashtra and Goa. With VoLTE, customers can now enjoy seamless and high quality voice calls on our robust 4G network.