The telco has also said it plans to make 5G available anywhere in the U.K. by 2028
U.K. carrier EE announced its 5G network has already reached 60% population coverage in the country.
EE, which had launched its 5G network in May 2019, is also offering 4G services in 87% of the country’s territory.
The telco said it has recently launched 5G services in 19 locations: Abergavenny/Y Fenni, Banbury, Basildon, Beverley, Chepstow/Cas-Gwent, Coatbridge, Corby, Cwmbran, Immingham, Llanelli, Margate, Preston, Reading, Shrewsbury, Slough, Tewkesbury, Warrington, Windsor and Wishaw. That announcement was part of additional news that benchmarking company Rootmetrics had once again ranked EE’s network at the top of U.K. networks across various metrics from speed to reliability.
EE initially launched 5G technology in London, Edinburgh, Belfast, Cardiff, Birmingham and Manchester. Other large cities in which the telco offers 5G coverage includes Bristol, Covently, Hull, Leeds, Leicester, Liverpool, Newcastle, Nottingham, Sheffield and Sunderland.
The telco has also said it plans to make 5G available anywhere in the U.K. by 2028, through a combination of permanent 5G coverage across 90% of the U.K. territory and “on-demand solutions available anywhere beyond.”
To reach its current 5G coverage, EE used its 700 MHz 5G spectrum to offer indoor and wider rural coverage. EE secured 2×10 megahertz of paired frequency spectrum in the 700 MHz band at a cost of £280 million (currently $346 million); 20 megahertz of supplementary downlink spectrum in the 700 MHz band at a cost of £4 million; and 40 megahertz in the 3.6-3.8 GHz band for £168 million.
In September 2022, EE said it was deploying ultra-lightweight radio technology supplied by Ericsson with the aim of improving 5G energy efficiency and network performance across its footprint.
Ericsson noted that the new generation of radios weighed up to 40% less compared to the previous generation. Additionally, Ericsson’ said its AIR 3268 is the most energy efficient radio of this type deployed in Europe. Field measurements in active deployment have shown a reduction of up to 40% in energy usage, according to the Swedish vendor.
Operating within EE’s 3.4 GHz and upper 3.6 GHz spectrum bands, the new radio will initially be deployed over 1,000 sites across the U.K. EE noted that the first deployments of the equipment are in London, with sites in Manchester, Leeds, Edinburgh, and Belfast to follow later this year. The partners also noted that this technology will be expanded to more urban and suburban areas in the future.
Last year, EE claimed to be the first European network to successfully aggregate a 5G signal using seven different spectrum carriers.
The experiment was performed in collaboration with Qualcomm Technologies at BT’s Borehamwood lab, and used five 4G spectrum bands and two 5G. The latter included the 3.6 GHz frequencies acquired in U.K.’s latest auction in 2021.
EE noted that the lab tests reached 5G data speeds of 2.2 Gbps in with expected real-world speeds of over 1.7 Gbps on the network. A mobile test device featuring the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 Mobile Platform with Snapdragon X65 5G Modem-RF System was used to achieve the milestone, EE said.
EE is part of BT’s Consumer business unit.
