5G service routines for users have caused consumers to have more doubts about 5G

While the industry has painted many bright prospects for 5G to consumers, consumers have many doubts about 5G, resulting in many unsatisfactory aspects in the development of 5G services. This may be due to the many routines that exist in the operation of 5G services.

It is actually hard to say that the current 5G services are satisfactory. The three major operators have nearly 800 million users of 5G packages, but only half of them have 5G network users. In fact, the number of 5G network users is more than 100 million less than the cumulative sales of 5G mobile phones, which shows that consumers have many doubts about 5G services.

Consumers who have switched to 5G packages believe that the prices of 5G packages are too high. However, when they want to return to affordable 4G packages, they find that operators no longer have low-priced 4G packages. Users can only continue to endure expensive 5G packages, which is affecting 4G users who have not yet switched to 5G packages.

Users who have switched to 5G packages and own 5G phones are also dissatisfied. They find that when using the 5G network, there are often too many places without 5G signals, and even there are situations where they cannot connect to the network even if there are 5G signals. This results in a very poor experience for 5G users, so too many users choose to turn off the 5G function of their 5G phones.

The many routines of 5G services have caused many complaints from consumers. Now even the People's Daily has begun to speak for consumers, showing that the operators' 5G services are indeed unsatisfactory. In fact, the operators themselves have their own grievances about this.

The investment cost of 5G networks is too high. Industry insiders pointed out that the mainstream frequency bands of 5G are the high-frequency 2.6GHz and 3.5GHz, while the mainstream frequency band of 4G networks is 1.8GHz. This leads to the density of 5G base stations far exceeding that of 4G, and the price of 5G base stations is also far higher than that of 4G. The ultra-high base station density and expensive 5G base stations result in the investment amount required for operators to build a nationwide 5G network far exceeding that of 4G.

After the 5G network is built, operators are still facing the problem of excessively high operating costs. The power consumption of 5G base stations is almost three times that of 4G. China Mobile's performance in the first half of 2021 showed that energy costs had increased by nearly 50% compared with 2019. At that time, the number of 5G base stations was far less than that of 4G base stations. If a nationwide 5G network is built, the electricity bill of the 5G network will probably be even more staggering. Currently, the three major operators have chosen to shut down 5G base stations during idle periods.

The high investment and operating costs have forced operators to significantly increase the prices of 5G packages in the hope of quickly recovering their investment costs. After all, they have only been commercializing 4G for about five years, and the investment costs of 4G have not yet been recovered, so they cannot invest significantly in 5G networks in the short term.

The expensive investment and operating costs of 5G networks have resulted in their 5G network construction progress being much slower than 4G. China has currently built more than 1.5 million 5G base stations, and each of the two 5G networks has more than 700,000 5G base stations. When China Mobile commercialized 4G, it built more than 700,000 4G base stations in the first year.

Due to doubts about 5G from all sides and the financial pressure on operators themselves, operators have decided to reduce their investment in 5G networks in the next three years, which in turn will further affect consumers' experience of 5G networks.

It can be said that today's 5G is facing a philosophical problem of chicken and egg. Consumers want a more complete 5G network for a better experience but are unwilling to pay high 5G package fees. If operators cannot continue to obtain high income from consumers, they will naturally not be able to speed up the construction of 5G networks and pay high costs to maintain the operation of 5G networks. How can this problem be solved?