It’s been in development for awhile, but the 3GPP — the organization that governs cellular standards — has officially signed off on the first specification for 5G (specifically, the 5G NR standard) at a meeting in Lisbon, Portugal, according to a report from Fierce Wireless.
Having a formal agreed upon standard of what 5G networks will actually look like is a huge step forward for getting real, commercial 5G networks up and running, as it gives companies a hard specification for what they need to be building.
As expected, the finished 5G specification covers a wide range of spectrum, ranging from the 600 and 700 MHz bands to the millimeter wave portion of the spectrum at 50 GHz. We’ll know more when the finalized standards are published later this week as to the exact details for 5G.
Now that the standard has been agreed upon, the ball is firmly in the court of carriers and hardware companies to deliver, something that may still take a while to happen. For example, the International Telecommunication Union (the ITU) and the 3GPP officially defined a “4G” network as providing a 100 Mbps data rate when moving and a 1 Gpbs (or one gigabit) while stationary, something that our so-called 4G and LTE networks certainly don’t provide today. (The LTE Advanced and Advanced Pro standards will hopefully finally deliver on those speeds.)
Still, having a formal goalpost to work towards is a hugely important part of the process, especially with companies like T-Mobile and Verizon already promising 5G networks to start rolling out in 2018 and 2019. And at the very least, the 5G NR standard is significantly more progress than just having a logo.
Comments
So, is there a link to the spec?
By Someguyperson on 12.20.17 5:20pm
http://www.3gpp.org/ftp/Specs/latest-drafts/
Read from 38xxx.zip onwards. 38.101 is the specification for devices, 38.104 is the specification for cell towers.
By sherifhanna on 12.20.17 6:19pm
Can’t wait for my wireless carrier to choose which sites get to utilize these speeds #RIPNetNeutrality
By mjboldy on 12.20.17 5:35pm
So we have a new spec to tell us how far behind South Korea we are?
By HTC864 on 12.20.17 6:09pm
South Korea is 20% of the size of California, 1/3 the size of Germany, and roughly the same size as England.
http://www.travelersdigest.com/7040-how-big-is-south-korea-in-comparison-to-the-united-states-germany-japan-uk/
By s_bl on 12.20.17 6:22pm
With 50 million people to boot.
By My Only Name Change on 12.20.17 6:30pm
And a huge part of those living in one huge city
By Marv89 on 12.21.17 10:06am
Doesn’t that jab work just as easily the other way as well?
I guess the bigger and more powerful you get the worse you get.
By Pingles on 12.21.17 5:10pm
I totally expect this spec to become available in the year 2000, considering the awful Photoshop bevels in the logo.
By DivinoAG on 12.20.17 7:23pm
The ITU never defined 4G. It defined something called "IMT-Advanced".
By BulletTooth_Tony on 12.20.17 7:31pm
It did, but everyone just ignored it. (more specifically t-mobile and from there everyone ignored it) and ITU just gave up.
By TheWay1 on 12.21.17 7:12am
No, really. They didn’t.
While T-Mobile ran to the front of the line on the term is an accurate statement. It was also an undefined term at that point. But Sprint was also calling their slow ass WiMAX 4G before T-Mobile, so T really just threw down the gauntlet because HSPA+ was faster.
By the time the ITU finally got around to certifying the final spec, they had to give it a new name and recognize everything else as 4G as well… which is fine, because they’re perfect marketing terms to describe big steps forward.
By BulletTooth_Tony on 12.21.17 12:32pm
No, ITU set up a final spec by then. Providers complained and ITU allowed technologies that CAN reach that in the future to account so ITU let LTE and Wimax to go as 4G.
Since T-mobile did not have the spectrum to deploy LTE at the time, they pretty much ignored it and called HSPA+ 4G. ATT who was behind on LTE also jumped on board.
ITU then threw in the towel and just called LTE-Advanced and Wimax 2 as "True 4G"
By TheWay1 on 12.21.17 4:04pm
No they did not. And that’s not at all how it went down. Sprint called WiMAX 4G. T-Mobile, having a considerably faster network in their HSPA+, responded by calling that 4G. AT&T followed suit. This happened in 2010.
The ITU then met at the end of that year, after all of this happened and said the following:
http://www.itu.int/net/pressoffice/press_releases/2010/48.aspx
By BulletTooth_Tony on 12.21.17 6:40pm
Specifications-shmenifications…
The only thing I need to know right now is if that beautiful logo is here to stay.
I mean, I LOVE bevel and emboss just like any other sane human being does, but I really think this logo could also benefit from a nicer font, Comic Sans maybe?
By nTrophy on 12.20.17 7:39pm
This is something that matters, and it’s good that you brought attention to it.
The thing that alters the way technology will work in the future for billions of devices isn’t a big deal, but that logo amirite guise
By Katholikos on 12.20.17 8:56pm
Hey man, this group does telecommunication standards wouldn’t want people getting confused thinking they had anything to do with graphic design or ever even talked to a graphic designer.
By My Only Name Change on 12.20.17 9:14pm
4G LTE is supposed to deliver 100 Mbps when moving and 1 GB when stationary? Wow, what a laugh when carriers only advertise 5-12 Mbps for their LTE service today. Therefore, do I expect 5G to provide anywhere close to what is being claimed? Goodness no, the real-world experience probably won’t be much different than what we have today. Maybe in the range of 25-30 Mbps or something like that. Carriers don’t have anything close to the backhaul capacity necessary to support even LTE’s theoretical capacity, let alone the capability of 5G. That capacity simply does not exist anywhere in the country right now. 5G numbers are just vaporware claims with no basis in reality.
By ggore on 12.21.17 6:37am
LTE-Advanced and Wimax 2 were the ones that qualified for 4G. They at a later point allowed LTE and Wimax to count since they were earlier revisions of technology that is capable of later being 4G. Then at one point those behind LTE/wimax decided to paddle HSPA+ as 4G. (And they labeled LTE as 4G+ and the like)
The bright side to the higher numbers even if you don’t see them in real life still benefits us. Because it means higher spectrum efficiency which in turn means more overall capacity.
By TheWay1 on 12.21.17 7:17am
I hope that 5G is more open like wimax and less like LTE. The high licensing fees of LTE has made device cost far more than they should have.
By TheWay1 on 12.21.17 7:25am
I doubt 5G will be an actual new generation standard such as GSM, UMTS, LTE which required new chips, new protocols, new deployment of network nodes.
It is more likely that 5G will be nothing more than an evolution of LTE, meaning same upperlayer standard just different transmission protocol (LTE updated transmission protocols many times already).
The reason i dobut it is LTE is prety much future proof, full IP, endlesly extensible standard.
By Lonsargg on 12.21.17 12:19pm