Exclusive test of MTN and ZTE’s 22km 5G network at sea – Photos

MTN and ZTE recently partnered to extend MTN’s public 5G network an impressive 22km out to sea and invited MyBroadband on a tour to test out this new coverage.

The expansion of MTN’s 5G network – dubbed the 5G Ultra-range Maritime Coverage Project – has been done to deliver high-speed 5G coverage off the coast of Mossel Bay.

The project employed dedicated 5G antennas on a standard 5G network tower that was installed on a site near the Mossel Bay port.

These antennas have then been directed to boost the 5G signal directly out to sea up to the baseline where international waters begin.

We were invited to join a voyage across territorial waters and conduct network speed tests along the way using the MyBroadband Speed Test app.

The testing setup comprised a ZTE outdoor mobile 5G router on our boat, which received the signal from the 5G tower on land and provided us with a Wi-Fi connection.

Our findings were incredibly impressive.

• At 10km from land, we achieved speeds up to 200Mbps.
• At 22km from land – on the territorial and international waters maritime border – we achieved an impressive 116Mbps network speed.

We document our voyage across territorial waters below.

Meet the team

The key team members who travelled out to sea with us. From left to right: Charles Yang, Director of Marketing and Solutions at ZTE; Dr. Ronnie Kritzinger, Radio Technology Senior Manager at MTN; Livhuwani Mpfumba, RAN Planning Senior Specialist at MTN; Yixin He, Senior Account Manager at ZTE; Chen Chen, Wireless Engineer at ZTE; Farhan Saeed, RAN Product Manager at ZTE.

MTN’s project leaders – Kritzinger and Mpfumba.

ZTE’s project leaders – Yang, He, Chen, and Saeed.

The 22km journey – Mossel Bay port to the territorial waters baseline

The dock leading to our vessel.

The 36-foot Jaguar Catamaran that took us to the territorial-international waters maritime baseline – 22km from land.

Boarding the catamaran.

We received a safety briefing from our skipper before setting sail.

Exiting the Mossel Bay harbour.

Network equipment

The ZTE outdoor mobile 5G router that received the signal and created a Wi-Fi connection for us to test.

The 5G tower on land that uses ZTE’s antennas to boost MTN’s network 22km across the ocean.

Close-up of the 5G tower and its powerful antennas.

Network testing and results

MTN conducted speed tests on the network every seven seconds throughout the voyage.

Network test at the 12km mark. We achieved speeds up to 200Mbps at 10km before this, but rough weather made it challenging to document.

Network test at the 15km mark.

Results at the 22km mark

Our best network testing result 22km from land – an impressive 116.92Mbps.

Another result hitting over 100Mbps.

We also tested several devices simultaneously and achieved 67.36Mbps, 71.8Mbps, and 68.8Mbps – totalling 208Mbps.