Sprint’s first 5G markets will include Phoenix and Kansas City, as well as New York City, when the carrier begins officially rolling out its 5G network sometime in 2019. It’s important to note that these three newly added cities won’t be the first and only three when the technology is rolled out. Instead they will be added to a larger list of cities which has already been announced by the carrier and which could grow even larger as the time for the 5G network rollout gets closer and closer.
In addition to Phoenix, New York City, and Kansas City, Sprint plans to roll 5G out in LA, Houston, Chicago, Dallas, Atlanta, and Washington D.C., and Sprint does point out that it will announce more markets for 5G at a later date, but it doesn’t mention what that later date would be, only highlighting that it has every intention of rolling the 5G network out nationwide. A nationwide 5G network is something that Sprint is also not alone in when it comes to planned network improvements. This same sentiment was echoed by both Sprint’s CEO Marcelo Claure and T-Mobile’s CEO John Legere during the video confirmation about T-Mobile’s plans to acquire Sprint for upwards of $25 Billion.
In that video the Sprint and T-Mobile leaders discuss how the two carriers together would be the only ones capable of rolling out a truly nationwide 5G network, so it shouldn’t be a huge surprise to see Sprint making inroads in terms of which cities to target for the planned 5G network rollout. Sprint’s ambition to be a leader in the 5G network market appears to be taking shape and continues with naming more locations where its customers will be able to take advantage of the technology. Sprint also boasts that with 5G, its customers will experience increased reliability on the network for calls, messages, and data, and that speeds of the data will be up to ten times faster than they are now.