We’reonthecuspofa mobilerevolution:asnew5Gphonesconnect
tonew5GnetworksacrosstheUK.You’llbeabletoenjoysuper-fast,
super-stabledataaccesswhereveryoumayroam.ByDavidNield
IMAGE SOURCE: GETTY
G isn’tjustontheway– as
of2020,it’shere.Today
youcangooutandbuy
yourselfa 5G-ready
handset,andenjoyblazing
fast5Gspeedsonyourmobilenetwork,
assumingyou’restoodinoneofthe
spots in the country that are covered- a list that’s grown strongly, and will
get bigger in 2020, but still has a lot
of limitations.
While you might think 4G is fast
enough for your sports streaming and
your Twitter browsing, 5G is on a whole
new level: expect average download
speeds of 150-200Mbps (almost 10
times faster than 4G) and peak speeds
of 1Gbps (more than six times the
maximum rate of 4G). As the technology
improves, 5G should get faster still. And
it’s not just about raw speed: latency
(thelagbetweenrequestingsomething
fromthewebandactuallygettingit)
shouldimprovebythreeorfourtimes
comparedwith4G.Webpagesand
videoswillappearina snap,andapps
thatrequirecontentfromthecloud(like
VRorARexperiences)shouldloadup
almost instantly.
5G vastly improves on bandwidth too,
which means your phone won’t suddenly
be unable to get a connection when
you’re at a sports stadium or a music gig- there will be plenty of connectivity to
go around, no matter how many people
get crowded into one place.
Add all that together and we’re talking
about a genuine transformation in what
you can do with your phone and how
you can use it, and 5G is going fully
mainstream this year. The number of
cities covered is growing from a handful
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tolaunchwithouta 5Gvariant.
That’sdueinparttothearrivalof
Qualcomm’snewSnapdragon 865 and
Snapdragon 875 chips,thesiliconthat’s
expectedtopowerthemajorityof
top-end Android phones that get
launched over the next 12 months.
These have 5G modems as part of them,
so phone makers now have no excuse
for not offering at least one 5G phone
during the course of 2020.
Once you’ve got the phone, and the
network support, you’re ready to start
enjoying 5G and all WKHEHQHÀWVLW
brings: super-stable video calls, movies
downloading in seconds rather than
minutes, cloud content that appears as
quickly as it would if it was stored on
your phone, and plenty more besides.5
Technology
The year of 5G