The number of 5G mobile subscriptions globally will reach 1.6 billion by the end of this year, according to new data from Ericsson.
According to Telecoms.com, that is more than the Swedish equipment maker and font of industry knowledge predicted just a few short months ago.
The latest edition of Ericsson’s Mobility Report opens with the assertion that “5G standalone brings new opportunities,” which sounds promising, but there’s nothing in the report that we haven’t heard before. The vendor touches on the usual benefits of 5G SA: essentially, use cases that rely on low latency, higher speeds, improved capacity, and network slicing.
“But while it seeks to strike an optimistic note on the promise of 5G SA, its assertion that “more than 40 service providers have deployed or launched 5G SA in public networks,” is a bit weak at best. To put that in context, around 280 service providers globally have launched commercial 5G services.
“Ericsson’s numbers gel with what we have seen elsewhere in the industry on 5G SA. Dell’Oro recently partly blamed weak 5G SA deployment for a sizeable dip in mobile core market growth, at the same time noting that there have been just seven 5G SA launches to date in 2023, while the GSA – which worked with Ericsson on the stats for its Mobility Report – shared data that also showed little growth in 5G SA this year.
“But while 5G SA might not be living up to expectations thus far, the same cannot be said for 5G subscription growth, albeit for the most part based on existing core infrastructure.”
As above, Ericsson predicted that there would be 1.6 billion 5G subs in the world by the end of this year, or 18 percent of all mobile subscriptions, driven by North America, where 5G penetration will reach 61 percent.
As recently as June the vendor forecasted that the year-end 5G total would come in at 1.5 billion, so clearly the market was moving faster than it once thought. In the third quarter, there were 163 million 5G subscriber additions, taking the total to 1.4 billion by the end of September. As such, the year-end target looks eminently achievable.
Further, Ericsson puts total global 5G subscriptions at 5.3 billion by the end of 2029, by which date 5G network coverage should reach 85 percent of the population, up from 45 percent at the end of this year.
“And those customers will be using plenty of data. Average global mobile data consumption per smartphone will come in at 56 GB per month by end-2029, Ericsson predicts, up from 21 GB this year. That’s quite a hike. Indeed, Ericsson expects a threefold increase in total mobile data traffic over the six years, driven by improved device capabilities, an increase in data-intensive content, and ongoing network performance improvements.”
