So, why are some 5G connections so slow? The first, and most impactful, reason is that the far-reaching 5G signals that have powered the vast majority of carrier rollouts in the US – especially from AT&T and, to a lesser extent, T-Mobile – have used low-band carrier frequencies.
5G is different from 4G because it's the newest form of wireless technology. It's over twice as fast as 4G on average and can deliver speeds of up to 1,000 Mbps in some urban areas. 5G phone and hotspot users experience less network congestion and lower latency rates.
5G rollout promised speeds 600 times faster than 4G networks. But, 5G connections are often slow due to less dedicated bandwidth for 5G networks vs. 4G or LTE networks, which are still more widely used. Until there's more demand from mobile carriers, 5G will likely remain slow in certain areas.
Some of these factors include distance from network nodes / cell sites, obstructions, interference from other electronic devices, building materials, construction, terrain / geography, and even significant growth of foliage can contribute to the blockage of signal, resulting in a slow or unstable connection.
The biggest difference between 4G and 5G is latency. 5G promises low latency under 5 milliseconds, while 4G latency ranges from 60 ms to 98 ms. In addition, with lower latency comes advancements in other areas, such as faster download speeds.
There are two issues for Australian 5G speeds. The primary is that despite Telstra insistence that it covers 50% of Australians and 75% of the population by the end of June, it does not! nPerf (based on real 5G user's) shows minimal reception. The second is real download and upload speed.
If you were using LTE before and 5G is slow, that's clearly a cellular carrier issue. It's an issue with many networks because cellular carriers have been in such a hurry to turn on 5G that devices connect to 5G on the tower before the infrastructure to the tower can be upgraded.
You may notice that your phone's battery drains faster than usual while you are connected to a 5G network. At this time, the 5G networks are only used for data connections and are not yet capable of carrying phone calls and messages.
Technically, 6G doesn't exist yet. But as experts imagine it, 6G is the next phase of wireless technology, incorporating novel approaches like edge computing and artificial intelligence to help make a completely new type of internet.
Therefore, the thing to remember is that 4G will not be going away anytime soon, regardless of how fast the 5G network grows. The plan is for existing 4G LTE networks to be used by carriers well into 2030.
Ultimately, the decision to turn off 5G or not comes down to each person's preference. Live in an area with strong 5G coverage and want those faster speeds? It's probably a good idea to leave the feature on. 5G isn't perfect and does use more battery, but in places where it works, it really works.
Investing in a new 5G phone is generally the best move if you can afford it since it ensures that your device will feel fast and relevant for years to come. But if your budget is limited, or the 5G phones available to you right now don't fit your needs, you won't be missing out on too much by opting for 4G instead.
They can be easily blocked or diffused by physical object (buildings or atmospheric and environmental events) and will have a smaller footprint compared to other waves (2, 3 and 4G)[3]. Also, there might be problems with moving receivers/transmitters[4]. The greater disruption will occur at the higher frequencies.
Does 5G use more data than 4G? The short answer is no – 5G doesn't use more data than 4G. If you download a file or load up a web page, it will take exactly the same amount of data to do that over 5G as over 4G. Yet data use on 5G often will be higher.
In the right conditions 5G download speeds can reach 10 gigabits per second. That's up to 100 times faster than 4G – and certainly the level of performance needed for an increasingly connected society.
Speed and Latency: WiFi typically excels over mobile networks in speed and latency. Nevertheless, 5G is comparable to WiFi 6 in terms of overall speed. Specifically, the latency (or the time between user actions and web response) in 5G is comparable to that of WiFi—a critical move towards supporting mobile gaming.
5G users on average consume up to 2.7x more mobile data compared to 4G users. The latest generation of mobile technology, 5G, doesn't just enable much faster average speeds than 4G, it also adds a tremendous amount of new capacity.
Optus is the outright winner of the 5G Download Speed award, with an impressive score of 272.4 Mbps.
With its lower latency, greater network capacity and faster download speeds, 5G represents a massive improvement over the 4G network standard. But while major Aussie telcos have already started rolling out 5G mobile networks across the country, this new tech is still getting out of the starting blocks.
4G is expected to last for at least another decade, and possibly longer with the help of Dynamic Spectrum Sharing (DSS), which shares available spectrum between 4G LTE and 5G devices.
There are several instances where it could be helpful to turn off 5G speeds. For example, 5G does use more battery than 4G LTE. So, if you need data and don't want to waste battery, LTE should be perfectly fine. Some carriers also limit how much 5G speed you have, and you might want to save your 5G data for a trip.