What ‘G’ is my old phone?
QI have an old, but working, Nokia 3210 phone (pictured) and I want to know whether it uses 3G or 4G (or anything else!). I entered its IMEI number into an online checker. Several websites told me to look at the LTE section of the report to see which frequencies it uses, and so determine whether it is 3G – but I can't find such a section or any frequency information. I guess this is a bit of an obscure query, but you have such clued-up experts at
Computeractive that I feel confident there will be someone who can help. Alan Turk
AFirst, we would advise against typing IMEI numbers into random websites. The support page of a manufacturer’s website or a trusted trade-in service might have a legitimate need for such information, but there are plenty of dodgy sites out there besides. IMEI cloning is a risk and, while the phone is very old, we’re sure you’d rather its unique identifier wasn’t copied to create a dodgy device.
That aside, we can tell you that the Nokia 3210 is compatible with what’s known as the Global System for Mobile Communications standard, or GSM. In the UK, that means it connects to the mobile phone networks on either 900 and 1800MHZ bands. It is neither 3G nor 4G – but 2G.
Remarkably, for the time being at least, 2G networks still operate in the UK – and so your 23-year-old Nokia 3210 could actually connect if you bought a compatible SIM and airtime contract. It takes a standard SIM rather than the more modern micro or nano SIM, but most UK networks supply multi-sim cards that pop out the smaller sizes.
Do note, though, that 2G support is being phased out in the UK, and will be gone completely by 2033.
All that aside – and while we think you most likely know – we should point out that there is little that such an old handset can do other than make calls and send and receive old-fashioned text (SMS) messages. That might be fine for whatever you have in mind, but forget any of the fancy features that you’d find on modern smartphones with 3G, 4G or 5G.