Sprint reveals first wave of 5G-ready markets

Earlier this year, Sprint revised its 5G network rollout to announce that it would be ready in the first half of 2019 rather than the later part of the year. To get there, the Now Network has to work with a steady release schedule that will build up to 5G wireless services for subscribers.

That will begin in April of this year, as announced today by Sprint at Mobile World Congress. The wireless carrier has now revealed which markets in the United States will begin the 5G rollout by being the first areas where Massive MIMO radios will be deployed.

Those markets are:

  • Atlanta, Georgia
  • Chicago, Illinois
  • Dallas, Texas
  • Houston, Texas
  • Los Angeles, California
  • Washington, D.C.

The first of the bunch to get Massive MIMO radios will be Chicago, Dallas, and Los Angeles, helping to bridge the Now Network’s wireless capabilities towards the 5G future, which is still on schedule to deploy sometime in the first half of 2019. For customers with supported devices, Massive MIMO will mean they will see faster network speeds and the network itself will see better overall capacity.

Atlanta, Houston, and Washington, D.C. will see the same network build-up sometime later this year.

Sprint confirmed that customers will need a 2.5GHz (band 41) device to see the benefits of the Massive MIMO rollout.

Sprint is also working with Qualcomm and smartphone manufacturers to launch 5G-capable devices in the first half of 2019, in line with the Now Network’s 5G network rollout plans. Sprint is one of the carriers that is fully supporting the Qualcomm X50 5G wireless modem.

Are you excited to see what 5G speeds look like on your smartphone?


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