What is 5G?
As of now, there is no official standard for 5G, but several manufacturers have already started coming up with the results of their experiments using it. But, 5G is claimed to be a major shift from what is currently available, the 4G wireless standard. In simpler words, 5G will be pretty faster as compared to 4G that exists currently.
The key principles of 5G are extremely low latency that is without delay, speed matching that means assigning bandwidth based on demand, multi-user and multi-stream connections that is more connections with the ability to transfer data via multiple streams at the same time and pervasiveness. The last one, pervasiveness means that when 5G is established, it will be everywhere. This way, there will be super fast, stable and uninterrupted internet connection without any dead sports or poor connectivity irrespective of your location. Furthermore, 5G is aimed to provide more connections on the existing bandwidths. This way, 5G will be able to facilitate the exponential growth of the Internet of Things.
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5G VS 4G
We already know about 4G LTE that is the most common 4G mobile broadband internet service that can reach peak upload speed of 100 Mbps and download speed of 1 Gbps respectively. LTE is nothing but a generic term for the 4G connectivity used in smartphones. There is another term called LTE-A or LTE Advanced that is used to refer to the existing 4G technology with faster upload speeds of 500 Mbps. Though we say faster, it cannot reach the speed delivered by 5G. As mentioned above, 5G is yet to official and there is no specific claim on its minimum speeds. But, it is noted above that the manufacturers have tried experimenting with the 5G technology and have come up with their results.
To be specific, Samsung did some high profile 5G testing and it has recorded a maximum speed of 7.5 Gbps while stationary and 1.2 Gbps while moving. Also, Ericsson conducted a test showing that 5G can render 5 Gbps of speed. When it comes to the Huawei, the firm has stated that it will release commercial a 5G network in 2020 and that it will render 1,000 times faster connection than the 4G speeds. Now, Huawei is promoting 4.5G that refers to internet speeds better than 4G or 4G LTE-A, but not close enough to 5G. Even ZTE has entered this space with pre5G that is capable of brining 5G like speeds to the 4G networks that are in existence with the multi-stream transmission and multi-user ability.
5G in Reality
When it comes to 5G’s existence, there are claims that the wireless standard will come into existence in 2020, but we can expect it to be restricted to government and military usage at that time. We can expect its large scale commercial availability to come later.
5G Smartphones
There are claims that Qualcomm will be launching Snapdragon chipsets with Cat.10 modem support in late 2015. Notably, the upcoming chipsets will support speeds of up to 450 Mbps. It might take 2025 for the vendors to come up with 5G capable hardware that can be implemented in smartphones. It has to be noted that the infrastructure necessities are high and the pricing will be too high initially. Hence, the availability of smartphones with 5G will not happen in 2020 that appears too early. Rolling out 5G not only depends on the manufacturers, but also on carriers as they need to provide data plans with 5G.
Conclusion
Though 5G is expected to be made commerically avaialble via devices that will come in the coming years, it is expected to bring about a drastic change in connectivity with its blazing fast speeds. It is impressive that the standard will facilitate in downloading a movie in a second. We need to wait for the implementation of this standard to know more details about it.
