It’s the end of an era. AT&T plans to discontinue landline phone service in nearly every state, including New York, by 2029.
The telecommunications company announced last week that it intends to phase out its copper wire infrastructure that supports phone lines for most landline users.
Since early this year, AT&T officials have called the company’s copper wire phone lines “antiquated” and require costly service that is not as effective as wireless broadband networks.
However, critics say landlines are a crucial service for people who live in rural areas with limited cell service, particularly older people who are more likely to rely on landlines.
AT&T currently operates a landline in 21 states and plans to eliminate the service in every state except California, according to reporting from USA TODAY.
Here’s what to know about AT&T’s landline services, and how it will affect New Yorkers.
When will AT&T eliminate landlines?
AT&T is aiming to eliminate landlines by 2029, the company said.
The company, which services more than 100 million customers, is allotting five years for the shift to give customers and the Federal Communications Commissions proper notice, an AT&T representative told USA TODAY. Mobile carriers must get permission from the FCC before discontinuing landline services for both new and existing customers.
“This is a multiyear process to ensure that every single customer has voice and 911 and access to an alternative before we are able to discontinue the copper-based landline service,” said Susan Johnson, the company’s executive vice president of wireline transformation and supply chain.
Why is AT&T eliminating its landlines?
The AT&T copper wire network is 70 years old and becoming increasingly unreliable, Johnson said. It does not do well in water or during storms and the company is “experiencing a lot of copper theft” with copper value on the rise, she said.
The network is also expensive to maintain and uses a lot of electricity and energy, Johnson said, adding it is not good for the environment to expend resources on a technology that only 5% of residential customers and 5% of commercial customers use.
Phone utility companies are also are struggling with equipment that is no longer being made and a shrinking number of employees qualified to service the equipment, Gartner research vice president Lisa Pierce told USA Today earlier this year.
How common are landlines in New York?
According to a survey by the National Center for Health Statistics, 12.2% of New York consumers surveyed have both a landline and cellphone. Only 3.8% of New Yorkers use a landline exclusively, the report said.
More than three-quarters of Americans live in homes without landlines: 76% of adults and 87% of children, as of the end of 2023, according to the agency’s most recent report.
Will other telecommunications follow AT&T in eliminating landlines?
As of December 2024, other telecommunications companies have not announced similar plans; however, Regina Costa, telecommunications policy director for The Utility Reform Network (TURN), said it’s coming.
“AT&T is one of the two largest telephone companies in the United States and they are about to launch a full-court press to get support for this,” Costa said to USA TODAY.
She anticipates other telecommunications providers who still provide copper wire services to follow suit.
Don’t want to give up your landline?
The company is offering a new product as a landline alternative for customers who don’t want or need a broadband connection.
The new service can be used with an existing landline phone that plugs into a jack, and it connects to AT&T’s wireless network as an alternative. It costs $45 a month.
You could also switch to another carrier that continues to offer landline services in New York, such as Spectrum, Frontier, Verizon or Community Phone.
This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: AT&T to end landline services in New York. What it means for customers