It's been a few weeks since we last saw any new Sprint 4G LTE coverage officially go live, but today the carrier revealed that its LTE network has gone live in parts of major cities like New York City and San Francisco. Sprint spokesperson Kelly Schlageter has confirmed to The Verge that the Now Network's LTE service is available in some areas of New York City, other portions of New York, San Francisco, Washington D.C., and select Florida cities, including Jacksonville, Miami and Tampa.

These activations are a bit more of like soft launches meant for network testing before the official, full-on rollouts, as the LTE coverage isn't totally widespread in the aforementioned cities. Schlageter explained that "deployment is just beginning in San Francisco," which Engadget has backed up by successfully latching onto an LTE signal in San Francisco neighborhoods like Potrero Hill and SoMa but not in areas like the Mission District.

Last year, Sprint began work on its 4G LTE network in over 100 markets across the country, including San Francisco and New York City, and the carrier has said several times that its customers with LTE-capable hardware are welcome to test out the LTE network while it's in the early stages of rolling out in those areas. That's precisely what's happening in cities like San Francisco and Washington D.C. today, as Schlageter has said that Sprint is simply leaving its LTE cell sites on after testing so that its customers can use them ahead of the official launches. That may be a bit frustrating for Sprint users that are only able to find LTE coverage in certain parts of their town for now, but it's also a good way for those subscribers to get an early taste of Sprint's LTE network before the service is fully rolled out. How many of you in cities like S.F., N.Y.C., D.C., and Miami are seeing pockets of Sprint LTE service this morning?

Via The Verge, Engadget