Why can my phone say I have 5G coverage and multiple bars of service in some areas, but apps and webpages still fail to load or load very slowly?
In: 3
Could be too many other users connected to the same cell, or the cell tower has a slow connection to the rest it the network.
Bars only mean the strength of the signal, not the bandwidth available to you. You still connect to a specific node and that node can only handle so much traffic and not all nodes are created equal. So you can have a strong connection to a node but that node may be overwhelmed. If you’re away from large populations, that node isn’t going to be top of the line or have as broad a pipe into the network.
And this is all assuming that your provider isn’t throttling your connection or whatever you’re connecting to isn’t having issues.
Imagine a cell phone tower like a game of musical chairs. The chairs may be very well built, comfortable, and sturdy, but there are only so many chairs available. Full bars and bad service can mean there just aren’t enough “chairs” left on the cell phone tower for you.
To add to the other answers, 5G only refers to the technology and type of signal being used to deliver data to your device. It determines the top possible speed of your connection from a hardware stand point, but says nothing about what speed you are actually going to get, due to other external factors. 5G is also short range compared to older connection types, so there’s a possibility your device is on the outer range of what is possible for a connection and hasn’t relinquished the connection in order to connect through a method that has a lower top speed, but might be able to provide a faster actual speed despite other external factors.
For me it’s frequently something that’s going wrong on my phone, not with the actual connection.
Service level, indicates the potential maximum.
Bars, indicate signal strength.
Your device, always connects to multiple radio towers.
The radio tower has a limit, it could be channels, it could be bandwidth.
To divide the available signal yo all of the connected devices there are many strategies that can be used.
Wave Division Multiplexing: you get some of the signal, all of the time.
Time Division Multiplexing: you get all of the signal, some of the time.
Etc.
Then there is your device. Many applications can fight over local resources (CPU/RAM/etc) and Network (bandwidth/etc).
It is a complex series of events that is wildly unpredictable even in the best circumstances.
TLDR; If you are experiencing connectivity issues:
– Toggle airplane mode.
– Reboot.
Assuming neither works, it is not your device, and you’ll need a location with better service availability.
I was told the phone actually doesn’t know if it’s connected to a 5G tower, or it just says 5G either way. I live in Michigan and they all said they don’t have 5G service towers in my area yet. It’s basically rare to have them in your area, even though the bidding wars have ended. T-Mobile has the majority so far.
The bars only tell you how strongly your connection is (direct line of site and close by is good, far away and inside a building is bad).
It has nothing to do with how fast the speeds you are getting.
Usually, if you have good bar strength and slow speeds, it’s because too many people are connected to the same tower. I always for instance get super slow speeds when I’m in traffic at an intersection. It’s the fault of the cell phone company for not properly allocating enough bandwidth; reach out to them on Twitter, I’ve done it for T-Mobile and actually have gotten them to make improvements in my area.
5G doesn’t guarantee you high speeds. It’s just higher than the 4G equivalent, all else being equal (wireless band, congestion, etc). It could still be very slow if you’re using a slow band and/or connected to a congested tower
Service bars only measure how strong the signal is from the tower, but if it’s a tower is congested or is on a slow wireless band then you’re not gonna get fast speeds.
Think of it like a bar, the service bars measure how well the bartender can hear you (and vice versa) but that alone doesn’t guarantee fast service. Maybe the bartender is just slow, or maybe there’s 20 other customers they have to juggle before they get to you.
5G would be the equivalent of a more efficient ordering system at the bar, but that’s only of limited help if the bartender is slow or the bar is busy. Networks love it though because the bartender can now serve 25 customers at once instead of 20, so they can earn more money without having to hire more bartenders.
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