A reader has a question about the implementation of 5G:
For close to a year, I have been hearing that 5G will allow everyone to cut the cord completely, that they’ll be able to use their wireless phone service to get Internet to their house and not need a cable provider. Is this true? If so, how close are we to this?
The potential is certainly there. But remember that a lot of this excited chatter is merely speculation about what 5G will be able to do. If it is able to reach the projected speeds, all of these projections could become reality.
If you’re not familiar with 5G, it stands for fifth-generation mobile communication standard. 5G has the potential to be 20 times faster than 4G. Some experts have called it so revolutionary that it will be like a second Industrial Revolution.
But the speeds mentioned are optimum speeds. And WiFi standards never meet the full projected speeds. Most of us only ever actually get a percentage of the speed 4G is capable of due to a variety of factors including traffic, our home equipment, and infrastructure in general.
5G isn’t going to be magically available in rural and mountainous communities where they struggle to receive 4G connections now. If the dream of having super-face connection everywhere is going to come true, billions of dollars are going to need to be spent on upgrading the infrastructure to make this happen.
Expect service providers to experiment with new services in the next few years. But there’s no way to tell how well they’ll work until they get deployed. 5G will provide faster mobile speed but whether it brings about a tech revolution remains to be seen.
Don’t expect instantaneous change just yet.