Experts say 5G's next iteration, 5.5G, could help autonomous cars, drones, and more, but everyday users may not see many applications beyond faster speeds
Dan Strumpf / Wall Street Journal : Tweets: @adrianweckler and @tcrawford Tweets: Adrian Weckler / @adrianweckler : 5G was a huge disappointment. 5.5G will be here in 18 months. And experts are already admitting it will have few consumer applications. https://www.wsj.com/... Tim Crawford / @tcrawford : Interesting article on where 5G is today and the upcoming 5.5G upgrade. Note how the US has changed. #CIO #5G #innovation #mobile #futureofwork https://www.wsj.com/...
Context & Ripple Effects
This story lands after years of diminishing returns on the 5G bet: Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile put $118.4B into 5G airwaves and network upgrades against $61.8B for 4G with little new revenue to show, and by early 2021 US 5G was still delivering roughly 4G-like speeds. The hype cycle visibly cooled when 5G took a back seat at CES 2023 while the industry pivoted to self-driving cars, AR, and IoT groundwork.
Against that backdrop, 5.5G (or 5G Advanced) is being positioned as the fix: per the CNBC coverage of ongoing 6G standards work, it brings faster uplink speeds, network slicing, and enhanced positioning — capabilities aimed at machines, not phones. The WSJ piece is notable because experts are conceding upfront that everyday users may see little beyond faster speeds.
First-order effects
- Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile face the immediate problem of monetizing an upgrade whose headline consumer benefit is just speed — pushing the revenue case toward enterprise buyers in automotive, drone operations, and industrial IoT where slicing and positioning matter.
Second-order effects
- With consumer pull weak, handset makers and carriers lose a natural upgrade driver, increasing pressure to bundle 5.5G features into premium plans and devices rather than letting demand emerge organically; competitors that over-invested in millimeter-wave-heavy builds face the sharpest justification gap.
Third-order effects
- If each successive generation keeps delivering less for consumers, the industry structurally shifts from selling faster phones to selling network capability as a B2B input — making standards bodies' choices during 6G work, and enterprise verticals like autonomy, the real battlegrounds rather than retail speed tiers.
The trend: Mobile network generations are decoupling from consumer demand, turning carrier strategy away from speed-tier marketing and toward industrial customers as the source of return on infrastructure spend.