Is 5G Home Internet BETTER Than Fiber?

Could 5G home internet be a better solution than fiber, cable, or satellite?

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[tonyp]

If you have an option for fiber, that should almost always be your first choice. However, 5g wireless seems like a nice option for the rest.

[Rassiel]

As someone that works in the network side of these kinds of deployments, one thing we run into with using 4GLTE and 5G to individual sites is that depending on the tower's location (and the general region of the sites getting service) you can run into a lot of VHF interference in the form of "Microwave Fading". this can effect not only your individual connection, but connections in the broader area, even powerful long-range transmitters risk running afowl of this problem.

Another problem we run into frequently is a form of interference that happens in the upper atmosphere called Tropospheric ducting, where temperature differences between the higher part of the tower (where more powerful transmitters tend to sit) and lower parts of the tower create a kind of airduct preventing the passage of radio waves.

Often times there's not much the consumer can do to alleviate these issues. If you've got 5G (or are in an area where 4GLTE is your only option) and you've noticed your internet being flakey in the early morning hours (2am - 8am) this is likely what you've been experiencing.

[NathanMillerVisuals]

The T-Mobile home unit was a game changer for my home! I live in a rural area that never had cable internet so we used satellite. When this came out we were now able to stream YouTube at higher than 480p, download faster than 5mbps, and game online.

[secoh]

The only option we had till recently was DSL/Starlink in our rural woodlands. Fiber was just rolled through and we are now connected at 1000/1000; I am so spoiled and can't believe how much difference there is from our previous connections!

[nathancrss]

Something that would be good to clairify in the video is that line of sight (LOS) is usually mistakened to be visual LOS by most people. It would be good to clarify RF LOS for radio antennas and dishes which requires the Fresnel zone to be clear of most objects compared to just a straight line in visual LOS.

[xSKOOBSx]

I called frontier to sign up for fiber (their website said it wasn't available here even though it was, which is a different conversation) and they had technicians at my house like two hours later. They even discovered they needed another, different team to help run fiber through the connected unit's attic, and THEY showed up two hours after that. Everything was done in one day. I was very impressed. I also dropped ethernet into each room from the attic myself so I have hardwired internet everywhere now.

[ultimablackmage]

It is in Australia. Our fibre network is constantly breaking down & super expensive, but 5G home broadband is cheaper & more reliable. Been working fine for me when playing online.

[raulhidalgo]

I live in the middle of nowhere where the fastest satellite internet available was 12 mbps download and 5 mbps upload, after tmobile 5g was available for me I get around 400 mbps download and 60 mbps upload. I game with 0 issues whatsoever and has been an absolute game changer for me

[prongles]

Picked up a 4x4 MIMO outdoor antenna to use with the T-Mobile unit. Went from 40/5Mbps to consistent 450/80 in a rural town where I cant even pick up broadcast tv. 15~25ms latency.

[odinsudons]

I have T-Mobile 5G home internet and I love it. It's $50 a month($30 if you have cellphones with them), no contract and no equipment fees. I average around 500-600 down and around 80 up. For a house of two with gaming and streaming it works perfect. No hiccups or complaints after about 6 months of usage.

[swankshire]

My town of 1700 has our own isp, that unlike charter(the previous monopoly) they actually service EVERYONE in the area. Fiber lines on every major street, and if you're too far away from a major road they have antennas and dishes for wireless Internet, with towers all over the place.

[jeremyrussell]

Had cable and tried 5G home internet. Stayed with 5G since it was half the price and speeds were the same if not better. If fiber came along I will go with that but unfortunately I am too far out in the country to expect that any time soon. Definitely worth a try.

[chudchadanstud]

Worked wonders for me, virtually zero downtime, I can move house without having to wait for the ISP to connect the internet and I can take it anywhere. I take my router with me on Hotel stays.

Had fibre, once a year there'd be some maintenance operation that killed the internet for hours. At one point, it was gone for days because some workers in another town accidentally cut the line. Never had dropouts "for maintenance" in years since I switched.

[TheawesomeMCB]

I know cable companies like xfinity were panicking when t mobile 5g home internet came out. Because xfinity had an monopoly in areas and once they had competition they had to do something to keep people on, like I heard that people got an free speed upgrade.

[McGreish]

Done this years ago with 4G+. Entirely possible, sometimes even more reliable than home internet. Worked well for two people at least. 5G was a thought in my mind though 5G routers can be extremely expensive to use cheaper than home internet. Though I can get the same speed in my house, the response time likely won't be as consistent or great. You also need to find a provider that does unlimited and doesn't cap the data if you use too much.

[nathanbrittin]

One thing that needs to be discussed is that these 5G home networks are not set up the same as fiber connections. They do not use or offer the same features as wired router. You cannot do port forwarding, which may be necessary for certain home server or gaming setups. And devices do not get unique public IP addresses, they all share one public IP address since most setups are CG-NAT style networks.

[timothymclain]

Verizon is $25/mo. getting 300 down, 100 up to each device. AT&T fiber was $100/mo. and got roughly the same speed wirelessly. Loved the savings. Had to switch back after 2 months of testing due to bad lag on video conferencing, voice chat, and gaming. Verizon is perfect for light use.

[daydream]

Where i live we dont currently have the infrastructure for full fttp.

We use VDSL, which emulates a phone line for connectivity to the router.

Its hybrid fiber. 54mbps down 20 up.

[austinsanders]

I don't have any options for fiber or dsl where I live, but fortunately, I got T mobile home internet, and it's great for me it's bundled in my bill for $30 a month. I live in a very rural area, and I get speeds up to 100mbps, and it can fall to 40mbps, but averages about 60 and gaming works surprisingly well. I'm satisfied for the price and the only other option is satellite, which is way to expensive. My neighbors have satellite and they're stuck with a contract, data caps, and slower speeds for 5x the money

[mrpeebsshorts]

Something else to consider is that Verizon's home internet router/modem combo artificially throtles the speed to 300mbps even if you have faster speed available in your area. for example, I typically get 700-800mbps down on my phone while no matter where I put the modem/router I always get 300mbps down and around 30mbps up. from what I understand t-mobile's home internet does not have an artificial speed cap like verizon does.