I live near Phoenix. Verizon is not available here; T-Mobile is. But it’s promised performance levels (35-100 megabit downloads; as slow as 8 megabits uploads) are not quite there for us. If and when I could get something of the sort that the author of this article receives, I’d consider it.
As of now, I’m stuck with Cox. CenturyLink is a flat 40 megabits (which translates to just above 30 based on their screwy estimate scheme).
Having unlimited data would allow us to consider a streaming TV service, but the ones I checked don’t offer all the locals we want.
I was really glad I read this article. I’m rural and no wired high speed internet is available at all. DSL tops out at 9-12mbps. Starlink not available yet. Terrestrial dish tops at 25mbps. Currently we are using T-Mobile service through the Simnet Wireless WISP. Speeds are 35/35mbps which frankly is a amazing compared to other options. But now finding out, via this article, that Verizon is offering 5G internet, at 1/2 the price of my WISP, is just too good to pass up trying, especially with no contract.
My concerns are:
integrating a new source into my home setup (really good router, multiple access points) due to needing to place their cube probably in a window, which is far from the inside network closet;
possibly needing to invest in a directional 5G antenna as my Vz iPhone 13 Pro typically is at 1 bar.
I’ve been assuming that cellular or 5G internet is likely going to become the dominant service for home internet given the infrastructure savings and the increased competition it allows. I did not know about the specific bandwidth limitation or the lack of IPv6 although I knew it was still inferior, albeit probably good enough for most people given the cost savings. I still get the feeling that it’s going to be profitable enough for the necessary cellular towers to be built to make it the dominant delivery method of home internet. It’s more than just a little less expensive. Its presence should lower consumer costs if nothing else.
I’ve been using T-Mobile Home Internet (older cylinder base) near Orlando since last November with 10x faster service than my previous Spectrum cable service. I always get 450-600 Mbps down, 40-60 Mbps up and pings from 20-50 ms, occasionally faster. I frequently measure my speed with SpeedTest and SpeedSmart apps on my iPhone that’s connected to the T-Mobile WiFi without additional antennas or extenders but reception is fine throughout my entire small home.
I’m fortunate enough to live in a neighborhood with Verizon FiOS fiber optic cable. About a year ago, I decided to drop the cable TV part of the plan and upgrade to their almost Gbit (980 Mbps down, 860 Mbps up) service. Leaving my last-gen AirPort Extreme in place, I get ~ 550 Mbps down/250 Mbps up on my WiFi-5 capable devices. My desktop, the last of the Intel 27-inch Retina 5K iMacs, I purchased with the 10 Gbps option, and connect to the Verizon router via a 10 Gbps switch and Cat 6E cables (overkill at this point, but it leaves room for expansion to other wired nodes).
I’ve been a Verizon Wireless customer long enough to be unimpressed by their “offers” of a few months of a package of streaming services I don’t use. From the Plus package you describe, Hulu and ESPN are of no interest to me, and a monthly Disney subscription is still inexpensive enough that I can make it part of my cord-cutting budget when there’s content of interest. (For what it’s worth, the extras with their wireless phone service are ususally limited to a pre-paid credit card…. that can only be used on Verizon hardware purchases. Somewhat underwhelming, and after the first time, when I learned the usage limitations, one on which I refused to take them up.) I’d caution against buying into any of their “Plus”-like plans that only offer a short-term free access to streaming services, because they’re going to keep charging you those extra $20 a month for three years regardless of whether or not you lose interest in those services. And I don’t need the Sling; I have an Apple TV 4K.
Why did I want ~ Gbit service? With five Apple devices, each requiring 1.7 - 6 Gbyte OS upgrades or security patch updates, I really don’t like waiting around for the downloads. Ditto for other high-volume content.
Fiber-optic connections via CenturyLink in my city are symmetrical—uploads are as fast as downloads. That’s great, but signing up for the service would involve stringing another data cable to the house and punching another hole in a wall.
I don’t know CenturyLink, but fiber is amazing in my experience. And symmetrical is only icing on the cake. Depending on the pricing, it may well be worth double checking whether you’d really have another hole drilled in the wall. In my experience getting fiber, they placed the fiber “modem” on the outside of the house and simply used the existing ethernet cable running into the house to provide internet inside. (A lot of phone wires run inside homes are actually just ethernet cable, where only 2 or 4 of the wires are being utilized. So they just used the “phone” line.)
I tried T-Mobile’s Internet service in Golden Valley, MN last year. I liked it, but I couldn’t connect to my company’s VPN. T-Mobile Support told me that was a known issue with some VPNs. So I had to switch back to Xfinity.
That was about a year ago; does anyone have any insight into whether this has been worked out?
Where I live up in the mountains, both AT&T and T-Mobile signals are very weak. I don’t know if they will ever provide stronger signals. Most people have Verizon and it works relatively well although I doubt if they will ever expand the 5G service into our area. Luckily, I happen to live within the coverage area of Vyve Broadband. I get the 1 Gig Wi-Fi although it never reaches the maximum speed. But who am I to complain? Some who are less fortunate have to rely on the slow DSL or satellite dish such as HughesNet.
Thanks for this article. I am using T-mobile’s 5G Gateway router/modem 5 days now. The T-mobile store at the mall offered a 14-day free trial, so I figured I couldn’t lose. The first couple of days, my broadband speeds were over 400Mbps on my iPhone and AppleTV 4K. My iPad and desktop Mac Pro were getting over 200Mbps and my Amazon FireStick in my bedroom was getting about 50Mbps. After that, I couldn’t get over 100Mbps on any of my devices until I read your article.
I decided to move the router to a higher spot where it got 4 bars instead of 3 as before. I couldn’t plug in my Ethernet cable there because the cable is wired through the wall and not long enough to reach the higher spot. So, I put the router back where it was, but the 4 bars still remained. I did some speed tests and suddenly the 426Mbps was back on some of my devices. My computer was getting 326Mbps–better than I ever saw before.
Even when my speed tests weren’t getting great numbers, I had no problems downloading large files while using Skype for video chatting. All of my streaming devices were working just fine.
I am pretty sure I will be sticking with T-mobile’s G5 service, especially since it is $25 less per month than Spectrum’s internet.
I have 21 devices using WiFi and all are working just fine. The only thing I have found that may be an issue—since switching to G5 from wired internet, I cannot use AirPlay from my computer to my AppleTV 4K on my home theater. It sends the audio to my TV but no video. I see my computer desktop picture only. That was never a problem before switching to G5, so I suspect there is some incompatibility there.
This all depends on your location. I have access to 500Mbit or 1GBit fibre (not through my monopoly cable TV provider, which like Comcast is a total ripoff) at a reasonable cost. 1Gbit fibre in my neighborhood is <$70/month with no throttling and symmetric upload/download speeds, I will hard pass on 5G home internet.
@julio will have to chime in about actually disabling the Wi-Fi on the router, but he explicitly tested using his Eero mesh network with the cellular routers and it worked fine.
It’s a good question. This is what I do with my Comcast cable modem since I rely on my Eero mesh gear. I poked around the T-Mobile router’s web admin interface but could not figure this out, so I asked my T-Mobile press contact. Even more unclear on whether it’s a Verizon option since the loaner hardware I was sent didn’t have an option to log in to the admin interface (as regular users are able to do). I’ll follow up if any useful info comes my way.
Symmetrical gigabit fiber rules, agreed. It’s an option where I live, so it’s something I’d perhaps pursue in the future if my wife agrees to the installation hassles. 5G access is simpler in this regard, and keeping my wife from getting annoyed is always my priority
I’m trying out T-Mobile Home Internet. I only have 2 bars no matter where I put it in my home. At late night I get 100-250 down ad 10-40 up. During the day it sucks. Maybe 5 down and 1 up sometimes more, sometimes less.
Their coverage map says I ought to have 5 bars here but I don’t and I can’t convince T-Mobile of that.
I’ll probably cancel the service. COX just upped my download from 150 to 250 for no cost and it has always run smooth.
Hi, thanks for the detailed article. I have watched Tmobile’s ads for a year and have thought about switching.
I have one question. My home service has a DHCP address, not a static, but it goes years without changing. I am able to use home equipment to store my office backups reliably; essentially, I have my own cloud service.
Does Tmobile provide an IP address, or are there other ways of routing now. If DHCP, do you know how stable it is?
Back before the turn of the century, a friend and I came up with a business plan to use WiFi mesh networks to connect a neighborhood.
The idea was to have one point where you have a high speed fiber access, then use WiFi routers from roof top to roof top. If you got enough people with WiFi, you could have a pretty sold mesh network.
From the antenna on the roof, we’d connect to a normal local WiFi router for a home network. Tests showed we were getting 15 to 20Mbps speeds.
The project never took off because of the fear of competition with WiMAX (remember WiMAX?) and the fact that cable operators could create their own WiFi citywide networks that would purposely interfere with ours.
Imagine once 5G takes off and breaks a certain density threshold. You could place a small 5G mmWave mesh router on a roof that would connect to other local 5G mesh routers. A feed from the roof router to a home WiFi router would allow a home network.
You would need maybe three of these routers per block to have a 5G network that could reach down the street. More customers than that on a street would make the network more robust. By keeping the 5G mmWave routers on the roofs, you eliminate issues with walls and provide excellent line-of-sight from one router to another.
The cost of these 5G mmWave roof top routers could be as low as $75 apiece.
It’s not viable now, but could be something we might start to see in about a decade.
