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A small but interesting development today. Apple released the latest iOS 27 Beta 6 software to developers yesterday and those who have updated their iPhone’s to the new firmware are finding that it finally shows a “5G+” symbol (or icon, if you prefer), when in areas covered by a 5G Standalone (5GSA) based mobile broadband network.
The 5G Standalone technology offers a pure end-to-end 5G network that can deliver ultra-low latency times, greater energy efficiency, better speeds (particularly uploads), network slicing, improved support for IoT devices, increased reliability and security etc. By comparison, early 5G networks used a Non-Standalone (NSA) approach, which was hobbled by being partly reliant upon slower 4G infrastructure.
At present not all mobile operators and devices will visually distinguish whether their customers are connected to a regular 5G NSA or 5G SA network. Most Smartphones will thus show a regular ‘5G‘ symbol regardless, while others might show ‘5GSA’ or ‘5G+’. Suffice to say, experiences do vary between devices and operators, but Apple’s shift to use a ‘5G+‘ symbol should help to set the pace for others. The change partly links back to yesterday’s EE news (here). The final iOS v27 release is due out next month.