Whether you are examining consumer use of 5G or business use of 5G, the question “is it better than 4G; how much better; and for what use cases?” is not as easy to answer as you might think.
“5G is faster” is the baseline value proposition most consumers will appreciate. Lower latency compared to 4G will not be perceptible for most use cases. That might well be a key attraction, however, for some enterprise use cases, where 5G might perform significantly better than other alternative platforms.
Still, “value versus cost” is almost always relevant for any product, save those instances where a particular problem can only be solved in a few ways, all the ways are costly, and the problem must be solved despite the cost.
The consumer version of that value proposition is something like :I have a new $1,000 phone and it uses 5G. I can get a 5G service plan for not much more than a 4G plan. Even if 5G performance is only incrementally better, why not use it?”
That might be the case even in instances where the amount of time the user would be connected to, and using, the mobile network for internet access is quite limited.
Consider a consumer user working from home on a full-time basis, and not required to travel extensively as part of the job. In such cases, the vast majority of internet connect time will use Wi-Fi. On a gigabit home broadband connection, that means a 5G smartphone might well get 500 Mbps to 600 Mbps on a routine basis.
In other words, 5G will provide the most value for a 5G customer who is out and about more than is typical; cannot often connect to Wi-Fi often and uses devices in areas with higher-speed 5G and/or relatively lower-speed 4G.
In some cases, 5G might appeal to users who want to replace home broadband with mobile-only usage. For most consumers, though, connecting to Wi-Fi instead of 5G will have some advantages, even when those users are on 5G unlimited usage plans.
Not many 5G connections can match that. So then the value proposition changes: “how valuable is faster 5G when it represents two percent of my total connection time; and when much of that connection time is when I am in transit, and I am not using the device actively?”
In such instances, even faster 5G is not going to deliver very much incremental value over 4G.
Proponents of private 5G networks for enterprise use cases, including manufacturing, might find it easier to justify a new investment in a private 5G network, though. That would be especially true when 5G ultra-low latency actually provides value for process control.
5G could make sense when the device density is very high, as well, when coverage of larger areas is required (airports, seaports, campuses) or when both process control of machin
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