Verizon Wireless yesterday decided to officially share some recent results of its LTE 4G network testing.

While Verizon somewhat humorously still compares its 4G speeds to current 3G speeds, the exciting news is in the details. We would hope a carrier's 4G network would be quite a bit faster than 3G of course, especially considering the sheer amount of cash providers are pumping into network upgrades.

All that money appears to be paying off for Verizon Wireless in early trials though, as the carrier is reporting peak download speeds of 40 to 50Mbps, and peak uplink rates at up to 20 to 25Mbps. Obviously, "peak" figures can never be expected in real-world use, though they are possible. Engineers are calculating the average download speeds to be between 5 and 12Mbps, with upload speeds averaging 2 to 5Mbps. Those numbers are nothing to sneeze at despite falling well below peak speeds. Verizon's current 3G network averages under 1.4Mbps on the downlink side, to put things in perspective.

Verizon is still planning to roll out its 4G network to 100 million people in 25 to 30 markets before 2010 is through, and says it is indeed on track.

Sprint, meanwhile, has already been rolling out its 4G WiMAX network for over a year now, and the company has plans to launch in several major metropolitan areas this year. It will be interesting to see how the two technologies stack up when they are more widely available.