AT&T vs. Verizon vs. T-Mobile: the third quarter of 2026, fiber deals, dividends and $1,000 over 20 years

AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile are the three national U.S. wireless carriers, and all three have filed their third-quarter 2026 reports with the SEC. Verizon is the largest by market value ($185.4B at the October 30 close), followed by T-Mobile ($165.7B) and AT&T ($144.2B). T-Mobile is controlled by Deutsche Telekom, which held about 55.0% of its shares in October 2026, according to its 10-Q.

Revenue: who is growing

In 2025 T-Mobile grew revenue +8.5%, against +2.7% at AT&T and +2.5% at Verizon. Two jumps in the long series are not organic: T-Mobile’s revenue rose 52.0% in 2020, the year it completed its merger with Sprint, and AT&T’s series breaks in 2020, because figures from that year on were restated without WarnerMedia, which it spun off in April 2022 and which became part of Warner Bros. Discovery. In 2026 both rivals bought fiber: Verizon completed its purchase of Frontier on January 20, and AT&T bought Lumen’s mass-markets fiber business on February 2.

The third quarter of 2026

AT&T added 379,000 postpaid phones and 769,000 internet customers, a record, including 442,000 on fiber; its earnings per share from continuing operations were $0.13, a figure that includes a non-cash charge on its Mexico wireless business, which it agreed to sell on October 13, 2026 (the deal is expected to close in the first quarter of 2027), and employee separation charges. Verizon added 406,000 postpaid phones, its strongest third quarter in five years, and raised its full-year outlook for the third quarter in a row. T-Mobile’s release does not report postpaid phone additions; it added 274,000 postpaid accounts, grew service revenue 6% and earnings per share 34%, and raised its quarterly dividend 15% to $1.17.

The carriers do not measure the same things. AT&T’s “Advanced Connectivity” service revenue, Verizon’s “mobility and broadband” service revenue and T-Mobile’s total service revenue are different slices, and each company defines its own free cash flow. The table above uses one formula for all three: operating cash flow minus capital spending, without spectrum purchases.

Dividends and $1,000 invested

Verizon has the highest yield, 6.29% over the last 12 months, against 5.19% at AT&T and 2.61% at T-Mobile, which only began paying in December 2023. AT&T cut its quarterly dividend from $0.52 to $0.2775 in 2022, after the WarnerMedia spin-off, and has kept it at $1.11 a year since.

Yahoo Finance treats the WarnerMedia spin-off as a 1.324-for-1 stock split and lowers AT&T’s older prices, but leaves the dividends as paid, which overstates AT&T’s past yield and its adjusted returns. The AT&T figures here divide dividends before April 11, 2022 by 1.324, so the spin-off is counted once, as if the Warner Bros. Discovery shares had been reinvested in AT&T. On Yahoo’s adjusted prices the 20-year figure would be about $3,370 instead of $2,560.

Insiders and fund managers

No AT&T director or officer bought or sold shares in the open market in the 12 months to October 30, 2026. At Verizon, insiders sold $16.1 million, led by director Hans Vestberg. At T-Mobile, director Raul Claure sold $119.7 million of stock through his company, Claure Mobile LLC, in February, and chief executive Srini Gopalan bought $2.0 million in November 2025. Among the 38 investment managers this site tracks, seven held T-Mobile at the end of June, worth $2.18 billion together; Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway held it from the third quarter of 2020 and had sold it by June 2025.

The figures come from the three companies’ 10-K and 10-Q filings, their third-quarter releases and other 8-K reports, Form 4 and Form 144 filings and the managers’ 13F reports. They describe what happened; they are not a forecast and not investment advice.