It really just depends where you use your phone. Verizon is great in many places but has plenty of gaps. What Verizon IS the best at is marketing themselves as the carrier with the best network.

When I was in grad school just north of Chicago and had Verizon, I couldn't make calls in the house. I had to walk into the driveway, practically into the street. AT&T worked great, even in the basement, and T-mobile worked only on the second floor. Then T-mobile built a base station a block away and I could make calls anywhere in the area. I paid the ETF from Verizon and switched to T-mobile.

In my current apt on the 21st floor in downtown Chicago, T-mobile works everywhere but my BF's Verizon reception is spotty at best. AT&T is unusable.

YMMV is the moral of the story.