How can one companies 5G be “better” than another? Doesn’t 5G refer to the speed/strength of the connection?
In: Technology
One factor is that 5G uses different frequencies of light (referred to as spectrum). The cell towers are a lot like a lighthouse where it’s shining a really bright (but invisible to your eye) light. Different frequencies of light interact with physical objects in different ways. To some frequencies of light, a brick wall is like a glass wall and will just pass through it. Others will go right through you like a glass version of you. Glass would be opaque to some of them. Some can really only go through the open air, the moment anything solid gets in between it stops the signal (the light from the tower).
In the US, spectrum is managed by basically selling it to different carriers. AT&T owns a range of frequencies part of the 5G standard. Verizon owns a different range. T-Mobile a different set. They generally interact with physical objects the same way but there will be differences. Some frequencies are better than others. This means that for places like cities the companies have to pay special attention to how their spectrum for 5G interacts with buildings and humans to correctly position their cell towers.
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