AT&T Consumer 5G Begins: The Slow Rollout of Super-Fast 5G

AT&T is launching its new 5G service Dec 13 in 10 cities, including Los Angeles (CA), San Francisco (CA), and San Jose (CA). Notably, the service is based on real 5G standards, unlike AT&T’s earlier "5G Evolution" offering, which in reality was just a variety of 4G. Still, AT&T concedes that the new service for now will only deliver speeds comparable to “5G Evolution”—about 158 Mbps, or roughly similar to the fastest available 5G service in the US offered by competitor T-Mobile. With the new AT&T offering, all four large US carriers have some sort of 5G service available to some consumers. Even so, all of these networks are still a long way from living up to the 5G hype. Most offer only a modest speed boost over the more common 4G services, while the few delivering the fastest connections are spotty at best. Meanwhile, other countries—including South Korea, Switzerland, and China—are on track to make high-speed networks widely available by the end of 2019.