{"id":556579,"date":"2024-08-22T07:05:13","date_gmt":"2024-08-22T05:05:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=556579"},"modified":"2024-08-22T07:05:17","modified_gmt":"2024-08-22T05:05:17","slug":"vodacoms-awesome-5g","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/5g\/556579-vodacoms-awesome-5g.html","title":{"rendered":"Vodacom’s awesome 5G"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Vodacom has boosted its 5G network speeds and extended coverage significantly in 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

South Africa’s biggest cellular network was the first to launch local mobile 5G services in May 2020, initially rolling out in a handful of areas in Johannesburg, Pretoria, and Cape Town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The launch was possible because networks were issued temporary emergency radio frequency spectrum during the Covid-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In our initial tests<\/a> in the first five Vodacom 5G Gauteng clusters, we recorded average download speeds of 154Mbps and uploads of 14Mbps, while latency averaged 31ms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although it only launched 5G two months later, MTN’s 5G speeds and coverage quickly bested Vodacom<\/a> and continued to perform better until at least 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, in 2023, Analytico observed<\/a> Vodacom’s average 5G speeds had surged past MTN’s, whose network appeared to be more heavily impacted by severe load-shedding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Analysis of thousands of MyBroadband Speed Test results for the year-to-date shows that this trend has continued.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Users testing their Vodacom 5G speeds recorded average downloads of 262Mbps and uploads of around 31Mbps. Latency has also come down to around 23ms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The download speed improvement has been particularly impressive in the last year. In 2023, the average download speed measured was 226Mbps, about 14% slower.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When asked about this improvement, a Vodacom South Africa spokesperson explained that 5G was a central focus for the operator. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Our 5G deployment strategy is driven by customer and use case demand,” the operator said. “We prioritise 5G in areas where the new technology is needed to support these requirements.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Our strategy achieved continuously enhancing customer experience and consistently
improving network key performance indicators , which reflect better performance, stability, and reliability.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps evidence of Vodacom’s growing confidence in the capacity of its 5G network is the launch of several uncapped 5G packages<\/a>, offered through third-party Internet service provider Axxess.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These products offer speeds of up to 500Mbps on packages with various fair usage policies, priced from a fibre-competitive R495 per month. The packages also contend well with MTN’s fixed-5G offering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Package<\/th>Speed<\/th>Fair usage policy<\/th>Router price <\/th>Price<\/th><\/tr><\/thead>
Standard 5G<\/td>Up to 500Mbps<\/td>After 250GB: Throttled to 2Mbps<\/td>R1,499<\/td>R495<\/td><\/tr>
Advanced 5G<\/td>After 350GB: Throttled to 2Mbps<\/td>R695<\/td><\/tr>
Pro 5G<\/td>After 550GB:
Throttled to 2Mbps<\/td>		R895<\/td><\/tr>
Pro+ 5G<\/td>After 750GB:
Throttled to 2Mbps<\/td>		R995<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Over half of South Africans covered with Vodacom 5G<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The mobile network operator has also told MyBroadband it now covers over 50% of the population with its 5G connectivity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is a substantial improvement from the roughly 30% coverage it had less than ten months ago and ahead of MTN’s 44% coverage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company has been investing roughly R10 billion annually in its network over the past few years. The current financial year’s capital expenditure budget is just over R11 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not all of this money has gone towards improving speeds and coverage \u2014 a lot has been dedicated to improving network reliability amid severe load-shedding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The rotational power cuts put a big strain on mobile networks’ backup capacity, requiring larger batteries and extensive use of generator fuel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although Vodacom welcomed the recent reprieve from load-shedding, it said many areas were still heavily impacted by load reduction \u2014 more concentrated power cuts to avoid overloading local distribution equipment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition, theft and vandalism, particularly battery theft, remained prevalent and contributed significantly to network downtime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vodacom said it remained committed to enhancing network quality by investing in initiatives aimed at elevating the customer experience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Leveraging insights from various sources, we identify key areas for network improvement and use this data-driven approach to guide our network strategies and priorities,” the company said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vodacom has identified optimising existing network assets to enhance performance, deploying new spectrum to improve coverage and capacity, and rolling out new sites to expand coverage as its key priorities. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The images below show how Vodacom’s 5G coverage changed from March 2023 to August 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Gauteng and surrounds \u2014 March 2023<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Gauteng and surrounds \u2014 August 2024<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n

Durban and surrounds \u2014 March 2023<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Durban and surrounds \u2014 August 2024<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n

Cape Town and surrounds \u2014 March 2023<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Cape Town and surrounds \u2014 August 2024<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Vodacom’s 5G speeds and coverage have improved tremendously in the past year. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341042,"featured_media":556625,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[62528],"tags":[81765,64917,81414,41,64474],"class_list":["post-556579","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-5g","tag-5g-speeds","tag-analytico","tag-mobile-5g","tag-vodacom","tag-vodacom-5g"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556579"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341042"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=556579"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556579\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":556662,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556579\/revisions\/556662"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/556625"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=556579"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=556579"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=556579"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}