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The road to 5G: the biggest news on next-gen mobile networks

Carriers around the world are preparing to move on from 4G LTE to 5G, the next era of mobile networking that promises ultra-fast data speeds and low latency between device and network. Consumers in the US can expect to start seeing 5G networks light up in 2019. All four major providers — Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, and Sprint — have promised to make 5G a reality in the new year. Even before those networks are switched on, smartphones from Samsung, LG, and other 5G-capable devices have already been announced.

The evolution and standardization of 5G has been a long process, but the technology could lead to major advancements in numerous areas like the smart home, media consumption, augmented reality, self-driving cars, telemedicine, and more.

  • Wes Davis

    Jul 25, 2023

    Wes Davis

    T-Mobile says its ultrafast 5G capable of up to 3.3Gbps is rolling out now

    Illustration of the T-Mobile logo on a tan and black background.
    Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

    T-Mobile has started the rollout of its new 5G tech that can deliver speeds of up to 3.3Gbps using carrier aggregation, which combines four different 5G channels into one for devices that can handle it (only Samsung’s newer Galaxy S23 phones at the moment), similar to a trick used by Wi-Fi routers to create a faster connection.

    That’s even faster than what you’d get out of mmWave 5G, which is more heavily touted by Verizon and AT&T as also being capable of extremely high speeds — Ookla recently reported download speeds of up to 1.6Gbps in the US. However, it has limited range and device support and is easily hampered by common impediments like trees and buildings.

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  • Sean Hollister

    Mar 9, 2022

    Sean Hollister

    5G’s false start is over and the iPhone SE proves it

    Screenshot by Nick Statt / The Verge

    When I rejoined The Verge in 2018, my first big assignment looked like an absolute peach — fly to the gorgeous Hawaiian island of Maui, sip cool drinks on the sand (The Verge paid for my trip; we don’t accept junkets), and become one of the first journalists to experience blazing 5G speeds at a Qualcomm event. Instead, I found myself exposing a lie. The first real-world 5G test turned out to be a dud, the speeds misleading at best, covering up the fact Verizon and AT&T’s millimeter-wave (mmWave) 5G wasn’t ready.

    For the next three years, Verizon and AT&T successfully employed a fake-it-till-you-make-it strategy, enlisting politicians to help them “win” 5G as if it were some kind of “race.” Their fastest 5G networks ran on a chunk of spectrum called millimeter wave that’s speedy but so spotty you’d barely get a signal without a cell tower directly overhead. Meanwhile, powerful phone makers like Apple were complicit in rebranding LTE networks into things like “5Ge,” helping carriers mislead customers into thinking they’d already rolled out the new networks.

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  • Jun 30, 2020

    Taylor Lyles

    AT&T brings 5G to Austin, Miami, Salt Lake City, and 25 other regions

    Illustration of the AT&T logo on a dark blue background.
    Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

    AT&T’s low-band 5G network is expanding to 28 new regions today, including Austin, Miami, Dallas, and Salt Lake City. If you’ve been waiting for a slight speed boost over your current LTE connection and have a 5G-compatible phone, you might want to check if your neighborhood is part of this latest expansion. 

    Technically, we’re talking about AT&T’s low-band 5G network, which has slightly better speeds and latency compared to 4G LTE. When OpenSignal tested 5G speeds from major phone carriers in downtown cities over the winter, it found AT&T’s low-band download speeds averaged 59.3Mbps. The low-band network is not to be confused with AT&T’s 5G Plus, a high-band network with mmWave frequencies, which offer far faster internet speeds than low-band offerings — sometimes over 1Gbps. The company also offers another “5G” option: 5G E. But that’s not real 5G at all, but rather a slightly faster version of LTE. Yes, it’s all a little confusing.

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  • Nick Statt

    Feb 5, 2020

    Nick Statt

    US pushing tech and telecom industries to build 5G alternative to Huawei

    Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

    The Trump administration is trying to accelerate efforts to break ties with Chinese tech giant Huawei when it comes to building out next-generation 5G cell networks, The Wall Street Journal reports. The goal is to create common engineering standards for 5G networks that would allow tech and telecom companies to use US-made equipment over Huawei’s. As it stands right now, Huawei is the world’s leading telecom hardware provider, and its best-in-class products are sold to large companies that help cell towers and smartphones communicate, among other technical feats.

    “The big-picture concept is to have all of the US 5G architecture and infrastructure done by American firms, principally,” Larry Kudlow, a White House economic adviser, tells the WSJ. “That also could include Nokia and Ericsson because they have big US presences.” Since President Donald Trump took office in early 2017, the White House has taken aim at the Chinese tech industry over both security concerns and trade agreements.

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  • T-Mobile launches 600MHz 5G across the US, but no one can use it until December 6th

    T-Mobile has flipped the switch on its 5G network, setting it live over areas of the US that it says covers 200 million people. While the network is supposedly live today, no one is going to be using it until later this week: the first two phones to support it go on sale this Friday.

    The “nationwide” 5G deployment relies on a slower form of 5G, using T-Mobile’s 600MHz spectrum. This “low-band” 5G essentially takes airwaves like the ones used for LTE and bundles them together with some new technology to deliver faster speeds.

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  • Jacob Kastrenakes

    Nov 22, 2019

    Jacob Kastrenakes

    AT&T’s 5G network launches next month with the $1,300 Galaxy Note 10 Plus 5G

    Illustration of the AT&T logo on a dark blue background.
    Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

    AT&T is finally opening its 5G network up to consumers. Next month, the carrier will begin selling the Galaxy Note 10 Plus 5G for $1,300, and customers on select unlimited plans will be able to connect it to AT&T’s burgeoning 5G network.

    Initially, 5G for consumers will be offered in five cities: Indianapolis, Pittsburgh, Providence, Rochester, and San Diego. An additional 10 cities, including New York, Boston, and San Francisco, are listed as coming “soon after,” and AT&T intends to have nationwide coverage within the first half of 2020.

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  • Jon Porter

    Oct 30, 2019

    Jon Porter

    Apple’s 5G iPhones will reportedly be powered by its first 5-nanometer chips

    Photo by James Bareham / The Verge

    Three of Apple’s phones will release with 5G connectivity next year with Qualcomm’s X55 5G modem, Nikkei reports. This modem will reportedly be paired with a new Apple chipset — likely to be called the A14 Bionic — that’ll be the first from the company to be built using a 5-nanometer process. In general, moving to smaller manufacturing processes makes chips more efficient while allowing more processing power to be packed into a smaller space.

    This isn’t the first time we’ve heard rumors that Apple is planning on releasing its first 5G phones in 2020, nor is it the first time we’ve heard there’ll be three of them. Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo made a similar prediction back in July. What’s new are the reports of the exact Qualcomm modem Apple plans to use after the two companies settled their ongoing legal dispute back in April. In the longer term, Apple is thought to be working on its own in-house modems having acquired the majority of Intel’s smartphone modem business in July.

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  • Jon Porter

    Aug 16, 2019

    Jon Porter

    Motorola’s 5G Moto Mod now works with its two-year-old Moto Z2 Force

    Motorola Moto Z2 Force phone
    Photo by James Bareham / The Verge

    Motorola’s Moto Z2 Force is now compatible with the 5G Moto Mod, meaning you can add 5G compatibility to the two-year-old phone on Verizon’s 5G network. In a blog post, Motorola said the functionality will be available from this week. Previously, the 5G Moto Mod was only compatible with the Moto Z3 and Z4.

    As well as adding 5G functionality to a third device, Motorola says that it’s also putting out a software update that will allow its phones to share power intelligently with the 5G Moto Mod. If the power level of either the Mod or the phone drops below a certain level, then the other device will give it some power (depending on whether it has enough to share, of course). Motorola also says this update will improve download speeds on Verizon’s 5G network. The update will be available for both the Z2 Force and Z3, and will come pre-installed on Z4’s purchased from Verizon.

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  • Jon Porter

    Aug 6, 2019

    Jon Porter

    AT&T’s 5G network comes to NYC, but not for regular customers

    Illustration of the AT&T logo on a dark blue background.
    Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

    AT&T technically launched 5G service in New York City today, but as with its other 5G markets, only business customers and developers will be able to access it. The carrier is selling Samsung’s Galaxy S10 5G for those who want to utilize its millimeter wave-based 5G data speeds. AT&T is calling the launch a “limited introduction” and a “first step” for now, but it boasts that this is the 21st city where the company has launched its network.

    Despite technically being the first US provider to launch its 5G network last year, AT&T is lagging behind Verizon when it comes to offering a 5G service that regular people can sign up for. Verizon’s 5G network is now available in a total of nine cities, and the company plans to expand to over 30 by the end of the year. However, even Verizon’s network is having difficulties reaching people, thanks to its reliance on the short-range mmWave technology, which means that you can only connect to its network in very limited parts of each city. But where you do get service, data speeds can be mind-blowingly fast.

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  • Jon Porter

    Aug 6, 2019

    Jon Porter

    A 5G phone from OnePlus is coming to Sprint

    A 5G smartphone from OnePlus is set to become Sprint’s fourth 5G device behind the LG V50, Samsung Galaxy S10 5G, and HTC 5G Hub. Sprint’s 5G network is currently available in parts of Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, and Kansas City, and it’s due to arrive in parts of LA, New York, Phoenix, and Washington, DC within weeks. An exact release date, pricing, and specifications for the new smartphone are yet to be revealed.

    In its announcement, Sprint doesn’t explicitly say which 5G OnePlus phone is coming to its network. Currently, the company produces a single 5G smartphone, the OnePlus 7 Pro 5G, which launched alongside the UK’s first 5G network at the beginning of June. However, the company is widely expected to reveal a follow-up later this year, similar to how the OnePlus 6T followed the release of the OnePlus 6 in 2018.

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  • Jon Porter

    Aug 1, 2019

    Jon Porter

    Verizon’s CEO thinks half of the US will have access to 5G next year

    Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg
    Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg
    Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

    Half of the United States will have access to next-gen 5G networks next year, Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg said in an interview with CNBC, citing the company’s upcoming ability to share spectrum between 4G and 5G users using dynamic spectrum sharing (DSS) technology. However, he also predicted that it won’t be until 2024 that half of the population will own devices that are able to connect to this network.

    It’s a big prediction from Vestberg, not least because Verizon’s focus on using the high-speed yet relatively short-range mmWave technology means that its 5G network is currently only available in very specific locations within the cities where it’s launched. Making its network available across half of America would require Verizon to significantly increase availability within cities where it’s already launched as well as launching in new cities entirely.

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  • Jon Porter

    Jul 31, 2019

    Jon Porter

    Verizon expands its 5G network to four more cities

    Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg
    Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg
    Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

    Verizon has hooked four more cities up to its 5G network. Starting today, customers in Atlanta, Detroit, Indianapolis, and Washington, DC will be able to connect to the company’s next-gen wireless network. The additions mean that Verizon’s 5G network is now available in nine US cities, after previously rolling out in Denver, Providence, St. Paul, Minneapolis, and Chicago. Verizon says its 5G network will be live in more than 30 cities by the end of the year.

    When we tried the network for ourselves in Chicago we found that it was capable of speeds of up to a gigabit per second. However, its reliance on using mmWave techonology meant that these speeds were concentrated in very specific areas, and coverage inside of buildings was basically non-existent. Verizon’s guidance about its 5G coverage in Washington, DC illustrates the issue, as it lists very specific locations where you can connect to the next-gen network:

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  • Chris Welch

    Jul 29, 2019

    Chris Welch

    Dish loses more satellite TV customers as it embarks on a mobile future

    Dish CES 2013 stock 2 1020
    Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

    Days after outlining how it plans to rise from out of nowhere as a major wireless provider in the United States and launch 5G service by the end of next year, Dish today reported its second quarter earnings — and they’re another reminder of exactly why the satellite TV provider is morphing into a mobile carrier.

    Dish lost 79,000 satellite subscribers in the quarter. The company’s streaming TV service, Sling TV, added 48,000 customers, but that still left Dish with a net loss of 31,000 customers and continues the narrative that pay TV is on the decline. Satellite is sagging, but Sling TV is a bright spot; it’s growing and stands out from rivals as the most inexpensive of the major internet TV services. Still, competitors like YouTube TV and Hulu are quickly catching up even after Sling’s head start. So after years of talking about it, Dish is branching out into mobile, and it got an assist from the US Department of Justice to get there.

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  • Jacob Kastrenakes

    Jul 29, 2019

    Jacob Kastrenakes

    Verizon says it has a secret 5G plan after T-Mobile CEO calls company ‘clueless’

    Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg
    Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg
    Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge

    On Friday, T-Mobile CEO John Legere called Verizon “clueless” and “dead in the water without a strategy” for 5G. Now, Verizon says it has a 5G strategy — it just isn’t sharing exactly what that strategy is.

    Legere claimed that Verizon lacked a plan to expand 5G beyond big cities since the carrier appeared to be relying entirely on millimeter wave, a type of radio wave that can deliver very fast speeds but only over short distances. Verizon’s advertising and public comments have been heavily focused on millimeter-wave deployment, but the company now tells The Verge that its 5G plans go beyond that when it comes to expanding 5G to the rest of the US.

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  • Jacob Kastrenakes

    Jul 26, 2019

    Jacob Kastrenakes

    T-Mobile CEO says Verizon’s 5G plan is ‘fake,’ ‘clueless,’ and ‘dead in the water’

    Mobile World Congress 2019 Brands
    Photo by Joan Cros/NurPhoto via Getty Images

    T-Mobile CEO John Legere took something of a victory lap this afternoon, using a call with investors to trash talk his rivals’ 5G plans now that T-Mobile’s merger with Sprint has federal approval. Legere called Verizon “dead in the water without a strategy” and said AT&T has been “lying” and “confusing” customers about its deployment.

    Legere laid out a coherent and entertaining (and if you’re his competitors, insulting) vision of the current state of 5G strategies while on the call. Of course, it’s all premised on the idea that T-Mobile, once combined with Sprint, has the one true vision for 5G, which is more than debatable. But his explanation isn’t necessarily wrong, either.

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  • Sean Hollister

    Jul 23, 2019

    Sean Hollister

    Apple, Google, Facebook and Microsoft petition FCC for super-fast Wi-Fi tethering

    Mobile Phone Mast, UK
    Photo by Tim Graham/Getty Images

    It’s rare to see Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, HP, Qualcomm, Intel, Broadcom, and Marvell all on the same side of the aisle, but there’s at least one place they publicly agree: they want chips and devices that freely take advantage of a new frontier in Wi-Fi, without pesky licensing or regulatory restrictions — and they’re telling the FCC they’ll need it to bring next-gen AR/VR glasses and data tethering to you.

    First, some context. Traditionally, Wi-Fi has been built on top of unlicensed 2.4GHz and 5GHz spectrum, but late last year the FCC unanimously approved opening up the 6GHz band for unlicensed activity as well, providing a huge 1,200MHz chunk of wireless real estate for all manner of devices to communicate without needing to rely on cellular. But that pissed off the cellular industry, not to mention utilities like water and power, which still use some 6GHz microwave antennas for their communication backhaul and say they’re worried about interference.

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  • Chaim Gartenberg

    Jul 22, 2019

    Chaim Gartenberg

    Apple reportedly in talks to buy Intel’s 5G modem business for $1 billion

    Photo: Intel Corporation

    Apple may be closing in on a deal to buy up Intel’s abandoned smartphone modem business for $1 billion, with The Wall Street Journal reporting today that a deal could be announced as early as next week.

    Intel announced back in April it was exiting the 5G mobile modem business earlier this year after Apple reached a surprise settlement with Qualcomm that would see Apple once again return to using Qualcomm’s modems in its phones. Intel CEO Bob Swan went on to clarify that Intel had abandoned the modem business directly because of the Apple settlement — without Apple as a customer, the company concluded that it “just didn’t see a path” forward.

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  • Chaim Gartenberg

    Jul 18, 2019

    Chaim Gartenberg

    Verizon launches its first 5G hotspot for $650

    Verizon has announced its latest 5G device — a long anticipated 5G hotspot, the Inseego 5G MiFi M1000. But the 5G MiFi M1000 is the latest proof that 5G isn’t going to be cheap: the hotspot alone is set to cost $649.99, before you factor in the monthly cost of data.

    That’s a big jump: the company’s current high-end LTE hotspot, the Jetpack MiFi 8800L, costs less than a third of that at $199.99. Verizon is offering a few ways to make that price sting a bit less, like a 24-month installment plan that just divides the cost into $27.08 per month chunks, or a two-year service contract that knocks the price down to $499.99.

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  • Jon Porter

    Jul 12, 2019

    Jon Porter

    Huawei’s first 5G phone is launching this month

    Image: Huawei

    Huawei’s debut 5G phone, the Huawei Mate 20 X 5G, will launch in select markets before the end of July, despite continued uncertainty around Huawei’s future as a manufacturer of Android devices. China’s state-run Global Times reports that the phone will go on sale in China on July 26th, while VentureBeat notes that the phone is currently available to preorder from Amazon’s Italian site with a release date of July 22nd, and will be available in the UAE on July 12th.

    The Huawei Mate 20 X 5G is very similar to the existing Mate 20 X externally, with the same 7.2-inch screen, and trio of rear cameras. However, internally its components have been upgraded slightly to handle the demands of its 5G Balong 5000 modem. Most notably, the battery has been increased from 4,200mAh to 5,000mAh, its RAM has increased from 6GB to 8GB, and its storage has been boosted from 128GB to 256GB.

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  • Cameron Faulkner

    Jun 27, 2019

    Cameron Faulkner

    Verizon’s 5G network is coming to Denver today and Providence on July 1st

    A speed test conducted on an LG V50 ThinQ by a Verizon employee in Aurora, Colorado
    A speed test conducted on an LG V50 ThinQ by a Verizon employee in Aurora, Colorado
    Verizon

    Verizon’s 5G service is switching on today in Denver, Colorado, and it will be available in Providence, Rhode Island, starting on July 1st. If you live in those cities, the carrier says that you’ll see typical download speeds of 450 Mbps, with peak speeds hitting 1.5 Gbps. Verizon plans to charge customers an extra $10 per month for 5G service, but it’s currently waiving that added fee.

    Verizon shared the image above of an LG V50 ThinQ, one of the four 5G-ready devices on its network, passing 2 Gbps download speeds in Aurora, Colorado. This is a huge improvement over the already-impressive 1 Gbps result that The Verge’s own Chris Welch saw last month in Chicago, one of two cities where Verizon initially launched its mobile 5G service. Download speeds will vary significantly depending on your proximity to one of the carrier’s 5G nodes. If you go inside or are no longer in the line of sight of one, you’ll drop down to a 4G LTE signal very quickly.

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  • Cameron Faulkner

    Jun 25, 2019

    Cameron Faulkner

    T-Mobile will launch 5G in six US cities on June 28th with Samsung’s Galaxy S10 5G

    Photo by James Bareham / The Verge

    The first phone to use T-Mobile’s new 5G network will be launching this Friday, June 28th. Samsung’s Galaxy S10 5G will only be available in the US cities — Atlanta, Cleveland, Dallas, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, and New York City — where T-Mobile has established millimeter wave (mmWave) spectrum, the groundwork for its 5G networks. If you’re in one of these cities, you’ll be able to purchase the phone, though T-Mobile makes it clear that its 5G coverage, like that of its US competitors, is currently extremely limited and will only reliably work outdoors.

    Be aware that the S10 5G costs far more than Samsung’s other Galaxy S10 phones: $1,299 if you pay full price. You can pay $31.25 per month if you prefer monthly payments, but it’ll first require a $549.99 down payment.

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  • Chaim Gartenberg

    Jun 18, 2019

    Chaim Gartenberg

    LG’s 5G-equipped V50 ThinQ is coming to Verizon on June 20th

    Verizon is getting another 5G phone for its fledging network: LG’s V50 ThinQ, which will launch on June 20th, via Android Police.

    The V50 released in the US last month as Sprint’s first 5G phone, and while we’ve known since it was first announced that it would be making its way to Verizon at some point over the summer, today’s announcement has finally given us the official release date.

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  • Sean Hollister

    Jun 17, 2019

    Sean Hollister

    The 5G iPhone is coming in 2020, says analyst Ming-Chi Kuo

    Photo by James Bareham / The Verge

    Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo is the most trusted source of Apple rumors — once predicting that the company would sell three different iPhones well over a year before that came true. Now, he’s betting that we’ll see the first 5G iPhones in 2020, despite the fact that Apple’s original 5G modem supplier is no longer making them anymore (via MacRumors and 9to5Mac).

    You see, we’d already heard that Apple might have a 5G iPhone by 2020, but it was slated to use an Intel radio chip — something which we’ve since learned won’t be happening, because Apple chose to go with Qualcomm instead, forcing Intel to close up its 5G modem shop. That came at a great cost: Apple agreed to settle all its pending lawsuits with Qualcomm and spent at least $4.5 billion to secure the chipmaker’s cooperation, for the sake of the iPhone’s future. The shuffle left us with some big questions, including when we might see the first 5G iPhone now that Apple has to scramble to swap out its Intel radios.

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  • Tom Warren

    Jun 17, 2019

    Tom Warren

    A week with the UK’s first 5G network: speed, coverage, and more

    British network operator EE turned on the UK’s first 5G network late last month in London and many other cities. As a London resident, I’ve had a chance to test out this new 5G network for at least a week now and get a better feel for the early days of 5G. We’ve heard a lot of hype about what 5G will offer, but right now 5G in the UK is launching initially on sub-6GHz frequencies, so a lot of that hype hasn’t come to pass. Sub-6GHz frequencies are great for more coverage, but they don’t have all the speed and bandwidth benefits that 5G has been promising to bring.

    After testing for more than a week with the OnePlus 7 Pro 5G, I would absolutely wait on the next 5G modems, more coverage, and network improvements before spending money on a 5G handset and contract right now. The network operators have raced to complete a 5G network, but it needs more time in the oven to be fully baked.

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  • Jon Porter

    Jun 14, 2019

    Jon Porter

    Samsung’s 5G S10 is coming to Sprint next week

    Photo by James Bareham / The Verge

    The Samsung Galaxy S10 5G will be available on Sprint’s 5G network starting on June 21st, with preorders opening today. The 5G network launched last month in Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, and Kansas City, and will be coming to Chicago, Los Angeles, New York City, Phoenix, and Washington, DC in the coming weeks. Full coverage information is available on Sprint’s 5G site. The Galaxy S10 5G joins the LG V50 and HTC 5G hub as Sprint’s first 5G devices.

    Sprint’s 5G network was not first to launch for consumers in the US, nor is it hitting the gigabit download speeds that Verizon’s network is capable of, but when we tried it for ourselves we found that it offered far more consistent speeds, and broader coverage than its competitor. Unlike Verizon’s network, it was able to penetrate into buildings, meaning that we were able to actually benefit from its faster speeds while we worked inside a coffee shop.

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