How hard–or easy–will it be to sell smartphone 5G to consumers? Some now believe it might be harder than it was to sell 4G to 3G customers. Maybe not, others might argue. When 4G launched, it offered real-world speed improvement over 3G of at least 50 percent, and in some cases as much as an order of magnitude.
The differences between LTE Advanced (4G+) and early 5G might be as much as an order of magnitude again. But the issue is how much user experience advantage a smartphone user gets from that increase.
Many users will recall that 4G provided a much-better experience than did 3G, both for browsing speed and video apps. It is not so clear that 5G will provide such clear advantages over advanced 4G, though.
| Generation | Icon | Technology | Maximum Download Speed | Typical Download Speed |
| 2G | G | GPRS | 0.1 Mbps | <0.1 Mbps |
| E | EDGE | 0.3 Mbps | 0.1 Mbps | |
| 3G | 3G | 3G (Basic) | 0.3 Mbps | 0.1 Mbps |
| H | HSPA | 7.2 Mbps | 1.5 Mbps | |
| H+ | HSPA+ | 21 Mbps | 4 Mbps | |
| H+ | DC-HSPA+ | 42 Mbps | 8 Mbps | |
| 4G | 4G | LTE Category 4 | 150 Mbps | 12-15 Mbps |
| 4G+ | 4G+ | LTE-Advanced Cat6 | 300 Mbps | 24-30 Mbps |
| 4G+ | LTE-Advanced Cat9 | 450 Mbps | 60 Mbps | |
| 4G+ | LTE-Advanced Cat12 | 600 Mbps | ? | |
| 4G+ | LTE-Advanced Cat16 | 979 Mbps | ? | |
| 5G | 5G | 5G | 1,000-10,000 Mbps
(1-10Gbit/s) |
? |
