How Do Cell Phone Towers Work?

When the telephone was invented by Alexander Graham Bell in 1876, it was hailed as a paradigm shift in communication. Suddenly, people didn’t have to stand next to each other to converse. If they had a phone, they just dialed a number and chatted away.

Of course, the telephone of yore has come a long way since then. Gone are the bulky frame, the rotating dial, and the interminable cables, and in their place is the sleek piece of technology that people call a cellular phone. Indeed, cell phones today are used for far more than just making calls but for surfing the Internet and basking in social media as well.

No matter how high-tech your handset may be, though, it would be mostly useless without the technology that allows it to communicate wirelessly—such as the towering structures that often dot rural and city landscapes.

Whenever you make a call, your mobile phone sends out an electromagnetic radio wave to the nearest cell tower, which then transmits it to a so-called “switching center”—a modern version of the switchboard—which connects you to the person you are trying to contact. The two of you are then assigned an available frequency channel so calls don’t overlap and other people can’t hear your conversation (or vice versa).