Over fours years in the making, the iPhone is officially touching base on Verizon. AT&T's chokehold in the U.S. for the most iconic smartphone ever created is over. Finito! Get ready for a carrier in the U.S. that will actually let iPhone users make calls that don't drop every few minutes.

Millions of U.S. customers have been waiting for the iPhone to arrive on Verizon and today is their D-DAY. Hit the jump for the everything you need to know about the Verizon iPhone.

Updated Antenna Design

Those iPhone 4 steel band leaks were real! Verizon's iPhone 4 has a redesigned antenna to work with its CDMA frequency. Apple's Tim Cook says the antenna change is going to "work great." We sure hope Apple fixed all that "death grip" stuff that plagued AT&T's iPhone 4.

3G Network, No 4G LTE

Verizon is stressing that its massive back-end infrastructure is completely ready for the traffic-load that the iPhone will definitely bring to its network. The company is really letting you know that it will not be like AT&T when it first launched the iPhone back in 2007.

Unfortunately, there is no 4G LTE for the Verizon iPhone. Nope. Tim Cook says that it would have forced Apple to make design changes for the hardware and it simply wouldn't do that. Cook also says that people want the Verizon iPhone 4 NOW. So basically, Apple caved in to demand. Perhaps the iPhone 5 or iPhone 6 will have 4G, but not this time around.

Calls and Data Will Not Work Simultaneously

Big bummer. For those who know, Verizon's 3G CDMA can't support calling and data at once. For instance, you need to hang up a call to use a browser. Multi-tasking just took a big hit with the Verizon iPhone. We already knew this was coming. The only way to get over this is for Apple to release a 4G iPhone 4.

Built-in Mobile Hotspot

One of the features that is really exciting about the Verizon iPhone 4 is the built-in hotspot. Anyone's who's used an HTC EVO 4G will know what we're talking about. Instead of needing a separate MiFi device, the Verizon iPhone will be able to be wireless hotspot for up to five devices. That's all fine and dandy, but what about the drain on battery life? Only time will tell. The iPhone 4's battery already sucks, adding more strain onto it isn't going to help.

Data Rates

Verizon didn't comment on how the data plans for the iPhone 4 would be, but we'd assume it'd be competitive to AT&T's plans. Unless, of course Verizon is arrogant enough to believe that it can overprice its data plans, simply because its network is supposed to be more reliable than AT&T's. The iPhone 4 will test how strong Verizon's brand is.

Rumors of unlimited data plans weren't announced. If Verizon does do an all-you-can-eat data plan, it'd put AT&T's 2GB data plan to shame.

CDMA iPhone 4 Exclusive to Verizon?

Apple's deal with Verizon is a multi-year, nonexclusive one. Does this mean that Apple might be working with Sprint to release an iPhone on its network too? Like Verizon, Sprint uses a CDMA network too, so theoretically, it's possible that Apple might ink a deal with them.

Pricing and Availability

The iPhone 4 will be available early next month. Pre-orders start on February 3 through Verizon's online store. Everyone else will get to order it online on February 10 through Apple Stores, retail, etc. Stop buying all those Blu-rays and get ready to fork out your money for this bad boy!

A 16GB iPhone 4 will be $199 and 32GB is $299.

Via Verizon