JANUARY 2020 PCWorld 123
- Seattle, WA*
- Sioux Falls, SD
- St. Paul, MN
- Washington, DC
Even if you live in one of the cities listed,
your 5G experience will still be spotty (go.
pcworld.com/spty) because Verizon has
opted to build out its 5G service using high
frequency millimeter waves, which deliver
the fastest possible speeds but also rely on a
very precise deployment. Every time Verizon
launches 5G in a new city, it needs to set up
a system of mini towers that are affixed to the
tops of telephone poles and buildings.
Since the network is literally being built from
the ground up, the rollout is extremely
laborious, so in some cases the 5G network
is limited to just a few blocks.
Verizon allegedly has a plan to blanket
the nation with slower-but-still-way-faster-
than-LTE sub-6GHz 5G, but it hasn’t
announced when, where, or how it will
begin rolling it out. Expectations are that it
will begin sometime in 2020, though.
AT&T: While AT&T was technically the
first U.S. carrier to deliver 5G via a handful of
hotspots in late 2018, its mobile deployment
has somewhat stalled since then. AT&T has
focused mainly on homes and businesses
with mmWave cells for its first round of 5G
coverage, but expects to begin rolling out its
sub-6GHz 5G to mobile customers in early
- That should dramatically improve the
coverage area, but AT&T hasn’t offered much
in the way of specifics. For now, AT&T is
mainly delivering insanely fast stationary
broadband via 5G.
However, that might change before the
calendar changes to 2020. AT&T announced
on November 21 that it will be flipping the
switch on its nationwide 5G before the end
of 2019 over its low-band spectrum in
several cities across the U.S.:
- Indianapolis, IN
- Pittsburgh, PA
- Providence, RI
- Rochester, NY
- San Diego, CA
Additionally, it says 5G will be quickly
expanding to several more markets:
- Birmingham, AL
- Boston, MA
- Bridgeport, CT
- Buffalo, NY
- Las Vegas, NV
- Louisville, KY
- Milwaukee, WI
- New York, NY
- San Francisco, CA
- San Jose, CA
Its unclear what the speeds are, but
based on the maps provided (go.pcworld.
com/mprv), the coverage is far better than
Verizon’s mmWave. However, since it’s using
a low-band spectrum, speeds will likely be
far slower than they are on Verizon.
Sprint: Sprint has put its 5G rollout on
hold as it waits for its merger with T-Mobile
