Techniques for utilizing multiple carriers to substantially improve transmission capacity are described. For multi-carrier operation, a terminal receives an assignment of multiple forward link (FL) carriers and at least one reverse link (RL) carrier. The carriers may be arranged in at least one group, with each group including at least one FL carrier and one RL carrier. The terminal may receive packets on the FL carrier(s) in each group and may send acknowledgements for the received packets via the RL carrier in that group. The terminal may send channel quality indication (CQI) reports for the FL carrier(s) in each group via the RL carrier in that group. The terminal may also transmit data on the RL carrier(s). The terminal may send designated RL signaling (e.g., to originate a call) on a primary RL carrier and may receive designated FL signaling (e.g., for call setup) on a primary FL carrier.