While all of the major carriers in the UK have announced their intentions to carry the iPhone 5, only customers on the newly-launched EE network and Three will have access to LTE. EE is the only carrier in the UK to run an LTE network on a band supported by LTE chips found in the iPhone 5, and Three intends to purchase some of EE’s spectrum pending Ofcom approval. O2 and Vodafone will be lining up to purchase spectrum on the 800 MHz and 2.6 GHz spectrum as part of an Ofcom spectrum auction, though neither bands are found on the LTE chip in the iPhone 5, presenting an even bigger problem considering these spectra are widely used across Europe and Asia.
Engadget notes that Apple has previously released additional network-specific iPhone models that support additional spectra, though we expect that customers who choose carriers who’ve built out LTE on the 800 MHz and 2.6 GHz spectra will be stuck on 3G.