“More Signal Bars on Your Cellphone = Better Cell Service”
While it’s a safe bet to assume that more signal bars on a cellphone indicate a stronger connection to its host network — they actually don’t indicate strength, according to DigitalTrends.
Signal bars on a cell phone are primarily meant to indicate how close the user and their device are to the nearest cell tower. And while seeing more signal bars on your device is certainly better than not seeing them, there are ultimately a number of other factors at play when it comes to determining signal strength.
“The way these things work is that the handsets report what they see back up to the network, and then the network tries to make an intelligent choice as to what technology, band, channel, etc. the handset is going to use for its next communication,” said Steve van Skike, a Senior Manager with cell-phone booster company, Nextivity. “It’s not always based on how strong the signal is.”