T-Mobile touts “nationwide 5G” that fails to cover 130 million Americans

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T-Mobile announced that it has launched "America's first nationwide 5G network," but T-Mobile's definition of "nationwide" doesn't include about 40% of the US population. "America gets its first nationwide 5G network today, covering more than 200 million people and more than 1 million square miles," T-Mobile's announcement said. The US Census Bureau estimates the population to be more than 330 million people. T-Mobile hasn't actually forgotten about the other 130 million people in the US, as a sentence halfway through the carrier's press release notes that "T-Mobile's network covers more than 60 percent of the population." At 1 million square miles, the carrier's 5G network also covers about 28% of the country's 3.53 million square miles, and it's far short of the geographical reach already provided by T-Mobile's 4G network. And, the 5G service T-Mobile announced Dec 2 isn't much faster than T-Mobile's 4G service. That's because the "nationwide" 5G covering 60% of the population uses the same 600MHz spectrum that T-Mobile already uses for 4G. The big speed increases on 5G are expected to come from millimeter-wave spectrum, but those higher frequencies don't travel as far and are being used primarily in densely populated urban areas.


T-Mobile touts “nationwide 5G” that fails to cover 130 million Americans T-Mobile 5G: It’s On! America’s First Nationwide 5G Network Is Here (T-Mobile) T-Mobile launches 600MHz 5G across the US, but no one can use it until December 6th (The Verge) T-Mobile Offers Free 5G Phones with Today’s Nationwide 5G Launch (telecompetitor)