A total of 318 operators have commercially launched LTE networks in 111 countries, according to the latest Evolution to LTE report from the Global Mobile Suppliers Association (GSA), Telecompaper.com reported on July 29, 2014. Israel, Madagascar and the Northern Mariana Islands are among the latest nations to access commercial LTE mobile broadband services for the first time. The report adds that 51 LTE networks have launched so far this year, with the GSA expecting the total number of commercial LTE networks to exceed 350 by the end of 2014. The most widely used spectrum for LTE deployments continues to be 1,800 MHz (3GPP band 3), now used by 144 operators in 70 countries, or over 45 percent of LTE networks. The next most popular contiguous bands are 2.6 GHz (band 7), used in 26.4 percent of networks in commercial service today, followed by 800 MHz (band 20), deployed in 55 commercially launched networks across 33 countries.

The report also reveals that 36 LTE TDD networks have commercially launched in 24 countries, with 23 operators having launched LTE services using only the TDD mode and 13 operators having deployed both TDD and FDD modes in their networks. According to the GSA’s data, 264 operators have commercially launched using the FDD mode only.