How Fast is 4G
One of the most significant developments in recent technological history is the advent of the 4G network. This leads one to ask the question How fast is 4G?, since all promotions of the network talk about blazing fast speed for mobile Internet and over the air data plans. If you look at all the new smartphones that have been released recently, or are on the way out soon, then they are all 4G compliant, and this goes to show the rising expectations from this network.
What is 4G?
4G implies the fourth generation of wireless Internet standards, and this is a step above the currently functioning 3G network. Over the 4G network one can enjoy extremely high speeds of data exchange and data transfer, and one can also enjoy enhanced levels of network security. What this means is that wireless networking will get faster, safer and more satisfactory than anything we have seen so far. Activities like streaming videos over the web, watching movies in real time, exchanging information and even watching live TV will become far more quicker and trouble-free than what it is already.
4G Internet service will primarily be used for cell phones, since these are the primary wireless devices in play today. Apart from these, even wireless broadband Internet will benefit from the 4G standards, and they will also witness an increased capacity for transferring HD videos, high quality voice protocols and other exchanges.
How Fast is 4G Internet?
This brings us back to the original question. The kind of speeds that we can expect from the 4G network will be anything between 5 Mbit/second to 100 Mbit/second, depending on the kind of 4G network your service provider will offer you. The upper limit of this speed is hard to pin down and state accurately, since it depends heavily on a bunch of external factors. The infrastructure that is put in place by the service provider will play the biggest role. It is this very infrastructure that will take some amount of time to put into place, so we cannot expect the best possible results from 4G network just as yet. To get a clearer picture we must remember that the 3G network took almost a decade to get into place completely.
The major service providers in the United States at present are AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile. Each of them now offers their own variant of 4G connectivity, but many people claim that these are not true 4G networks. The fact of the matter is that 4G connectivity will fall into place gradually, and not overnight. Here are the different variants of 4G network available.
- HSPA+: T-Mobile provides this form of 4G Internet speed, and they say it has rolled out to almost 100 cities in the US. Download speeds can run up to 42 Mbit/second here.
- WiMAX: This service is provided by Sprint, and it offers download speeds of almost 100 Mbit/second. The next level of WiMAX will apparently reach as high as 1 Gbits/second. Currently, 71 cities can enjoy this service.
- LTE: Also known as Long Term Evolution, this service is provided by AT&T and Verizon. Right now 40 cities can enjoy speeds of around 100 Mbit/second, but this is perhaps the network with the most potential.
Right now 4G connectivity is just something to brag about, and it is also pretty expensive. It is only a matter of time till the prices fall though, and for the network to be widely available to one and all. Once you realize how fast 4G actually is, you will not want to go back to the comparatively slower 3G mobile phones network. You will even get the option to use 4G Internet cards to access this network pretty soon. So all we need to do is cross our fingers and hope that this excellent new service comes rolling out sooner, rather than later.
