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AT&T, Verizon and Sprint are hard at work to roll out their 5G plans, but T-Mobile isn’t going to just sit around and let its competitors get ahead. The wireless network has given an outline for its early deployment strategy for 5G, and you can expect the have the actual service to be available before the company’s self-improved 2020 goals for nationwide 5G network.
T-Mobile says it’s planning to build the 5G networks in 30 cities in 2018. This includes on the 600MHz band and the high-frequency millimeter wave spectrum. Actual service will be launching in Dallas, Las Vegas, Los Angeles and New York City in early 2019, pretty much along the lines of what Sprint has planned. The company is also promising a ‘real’ launch with smartphones, not with hotspot pucks or fixed home broadband.
Before T-Mobile and Sprint, AT&T and Verizon customers are expected to get the service by the end of 2018, but T-Mobile is also betting that waiting a few more months won’t really matter to most people because they want more consistent coverage. The real challenge for T-Mobile, however, will be providing good and actual 5G service. Because of the untapped 600MHz spectrum, T-Mobile may have an edge here because it promises better range and overall coverage when compared to the 700MHz space that’s use in LTE today.
