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Short answer: AT&T is no longer the owner of a giant entertainment empire. After separating WarnerMedia in 2022 and selling its remaining DirecTV stake in 2025, AT&T is primarily a telecommunications company. Its current holdings center on wireless service, fiber and broadband, enterprise networks, regional telephone companies, spectrum licenses, and related infrastructure.
The word “owns” needs care here. AT&T Inc. controls legal subsidiaries, operates customer-facing brands, and owns physical assets and licenses. Those are not the same thing—and a subsidiary list is not a catalog of every brand appearing on an AT&T bill.
What “owns” means in AT&T’s case
AT&T’s parent company is a holding company whose subsidiaries and affiliates conduct telecommunications and technology businesses. Its SEC Exhibit 21 identifies principal subsidiaries, not every corporation, LLC, affiliate, joint venture, or foreign entity in the wider corporate family. See AT&T’s 2025 principal-subsidiary list.
- Wholly owned or controlled subsidiaries: legal companies such as AT&T Mobility LLC and Cricket Wireless LLC.
- Operating brands: names customers recognize, including AT&T Fiber, Internet Air, AT&T Mobility, and Cricket Wireless.
- Assets and licenses: fiber routes, wireless sites, spectrum, customer relationships, technology systems, equipment, and real estate.
- Former businesses: companies AT&T once owned but spun off or sold, such as WarnerMedia and DirecTV.
A brand can be delivered through several subsidiaries, and AT&T-branded service can use shared infrastructure. Conversely, another carrier can lease capacity on infrastructure AT&T owns. A brand name alone does not prove who owns every network component.
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What AT&T operates today
AT&T’s 2025 Form 10-K organizes its communications operations into three reportable businesses: Mobility, Business Wireline, and Consumer Wireline. The company’s current focus is connectivity rather than content.
Mobility
Mobility provides nationwide wireless service, devices, network equipment, and related services. Principal subsidiaries listed by AT&T include AT&T Mobility LLC, AT&T Mobility II LLC, and New Cingular Wireless PCS LLC. AT&T’s acquisition of BellSouth in 2006 gave it full ownership of the AT&T Mobility operation.
Cricket Wireless
Cricket Wireless LLC is an AT&T subsidiary operating under the Cricket prepaid brand. Cricket is therefore an AT&T-owned wireless business, not an unrelated carrier. It uses AT&T’s broader wireless platform, although the brands, plans, retail channels, and customer experience are distinct.
Consumer broadband and legacy telephone service
Consumer Wireline includes AT&T Fiber, Internet Air fixed wireless access, and legacy voice services. AT&T Fiber is available only in portions of the company’s footprint; Internet Air performance depends on address, signal, capacity, and congestion. AT&T’s annual report describes shared assets across consumer wireline, business wireline, and wireless operations.
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Business Wireline
Business Wireline serves companies and institutions with fiber, Ethernet, IP voice, managed services, wholesale connectivity, and related network technology. These enterprise offerings are not simply consumer internet plans with different branding; they generally involve different contracts, support arrangements, and service-level expectations.
AT&T Mexico
AT&T owns and operates specific Mexican wireless entities, including AT&T Comunicaciones Digitales, S. de R.L. de C.V., identified in the principal-subsidiary filing. That does not mean every Mexican telecommunications company or every asset carrying the AT&T name belongs to AT&T Inc.
The legal companies behind familiar AT&T services
| Principal legal entity | Operating identity or territory |
|---|---|
| AT&T Mobility LLC | AT&T wireless operations |
| Cricket Wireless LLC | Cricket prepaid wireless |
| Pacific Bell Telephone Company | AT&T California and related wholesale operations |
| Southwestern Bell Telephone Company | AT&T operations in parts of Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas, and related areas |
| Illinois Bell Telephone Company | AT&T Illinois operations |
| Indiana Bell Telephone Company | AT&T Indiana operations |
| Michigan Bell Telephone Company | AT&T Michigan operations |
| Nevada Bell Telephone Company | AT&T Nevada operations |
| The Ohio Bell Telephone Company | AT&T Ohio operations |
| Wisconsin Bell | AT&T Wisconsin operations |
| BellSouth Telecommunications | AT&T Southeast operations |
| AT&T Services, Inc. | Shared services and AT&T Labs functions |
| Forged Fiber 37 Services, LLC | Initially held acquired Lumen fiber-network assets |
These are examples from AT&T’s principal-subsidiary disclosure as of December 31, 2025, not a complete inventory of every legal entity. Historical Bell operating companies have also been reorganized over time, so saying simply “AT&T owns BellSouth” can be less precise than identifying the specific subsidiary that remains in the structure.
What AT&T actually owns: networks, spectrum, and other assets
AT&T’s most important ownership is infrastructure rather than household-name entertainment companies. Its communications footprint includes:
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- Wireless spectrum licenses and the radio equipment that uses them.
- Cell sites, antennas, backhaul, core-network systems, and related equipment.
- Fiber-optic networks used for consumer broadband, wireless transport, and business connectivity.
- Legacy copper and telephone infrastructure in portions of the traditional wireline footprint.
- Enterprise data, voice, managed-connectivity, and wholesale systems.
- Broadband and wireless customer relationships, technology assets, intellectual property, and operational real estate.
AT&T reported reaching 38.6 million consumer and business locations with fiber in the second quarter of 2026. That is a company-reported operating measure, not a claim that every location is serviceable or that AT&T owns every piece of infrastructure serving every customer.
Recent acquisitions—and their ownership caveats
Lumen’s mass-market fiber business
On February 2, 2026, AT&T completed its purchase of substantially all of Lumen Technologies’ mass-market fiber business for approximately $5.75 billion in cash, subject to customary adjustments. AT&T said the transaction covered more than one million fiber subscribers and more than four million fiber locations across Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, and Washington. Details are in AT&T’s closing announcement and the transaction filing.
The structure matters. AT&T acquired the customer relationships and business, while the acquired network assets were initially placed in Forged Fiber 37 Services, LLC, an AT&T-owned subsidiary. AT&T disclosed plans to sell a controlling interest in Forged Fiber to an equity partner and has treated the subsidiary as held for sale or discontinued operations in reporting. The careful description is therefore: AT&T acquired the Lumen mass-market fiber business and initially held its network assets pending a planned partnership—not that AT&T permanently owns every acquired fiber route without qualification. See AT&T’s 2026 filing.
EchoStar spectrum
On July 28, 2026, AT&T closed a purchase of certain EchoStar wireless spectrum licenses for approximately $23 billion. The licenses add about 30 MHz of nationwide 3.45 GHz mid-band spectrum and 20 MHz of nationwide 600 MHz low-band spectrum. This was a spectrum transaction—not an acquisition of EchoStar, DISH, or Hughes. See AT&T’s announcement.
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No, AT&T does not own these anymore
AT&T’s former media holdings are the source of most ownership confusion.
- Warner Bros. Discovery: AT&T separated WarnerMedia on April 8, 2022, in a Reverse Morris Trust transaction that combined WarnerMedia with Discovery.
- Warner Bros. and HBO: These entertainment assets left AT&T with WarnerMedia and are associated with Warner Bros. Discovery.
- CNN and Turner networks: CNN, Cartoon Network, Adult Swim, TNT, and TBS are not current AT&T subsidiaries.
- Max: The streaming service belongs to the Warner Bros. Discovery media business, not AT&T.
- DirecTV: AT&T sold its remaining interest in DirecTV to TPG in July 2025. DirecTV is not an AT&T-owned company as of August 2026.
The separation is documented in AT&T’s annual-report materials and Warner Bros. Discovery’s filing: AT&T’s separation disclosure and Warner Bros. Discovery’s asset description.
Why people still associate AT&T with entertainment
AT&T spent years pursuing a vertically integrated strategy: own the communications networks that deliver content and also own major content producers and distributors. That strategy put DirecTV and Time Warner (later WarnerMedia) inside the company. The 2022 WarnerMedia separation and 2025 sale of the remaining DirecTV stake reversed the most visible parts of that expansion.
Today’s AT&T is best understood as a large network company with a complicated telecommunications legal structure. Its “empire” is made up of wireless customers, fiber routes, spectrum, enterprise systems, regional phone companies, and related subsidiaries—not HBO, CNN, Warner Bros., or DirecTV.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Does AT&T own Cricket Wireless?
Yes. Cricket Wireless LLC is an AT&T subsidiary operating the Cricket prepaid brand.
Does AT&T still own DirecTV?
No. AT&T sold its remaining DirecTV interest to TPG in July 2025.
Did AT&T buy EchoStar?
No. AT&T bought specified EchoStar spectrum licenses, not EchoStar, DISH, or Hughes.
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