Verizon expands 5G Ultra Wideband service into San Jose

By Allison Matyus August 6, 2020

Verizon is adding one more city to its 5G Ultra Wideband network.

San Jose is now the 36th U.S. city to have Verizon 5G Ultra Wideband service as of Thursday.

San Jose’s 5G coverage will be concentrated in some areas of the city, such as Downtown, Little Saigon, West San Jose, Little Italy, and parts of North and South San Jose. You’ll get 5G access at San Jose landmarks like the Japanese Friendship Garden, the Guadalupe River Park, and outside of CEFCU Stadium and Excite Ballpark.

The Verizon 5G Ultra Wideband network provides higher speeds, ultra-low latency, and the potential to connect up to a million devices per kilometer.

Verizon storefront — Julian Chokkattu / Digital Trends

While Verizon was the first to launch its 5G network, other carriers like T-Mobile and AT&T rolled out 5G to select cities last year. This new mobile broadband replaces 4G connections and promises to have faster download and upload speeds for improved web browsing and in-app experiences. Communication between mobile networks will also have increased speeds.

Verizon also announced an expansion of its mobile edge computing (MEC) services, which combines Verizon’s 5G and Amazon’s AWS Wavelength. Currently, 5G MEC is available to customers in Boston and the San Francisco Bay Area. The company says that 5G MEC “brings together Verizon’s 5G Ultra Wideband network with AWS cloud services to enable developers and enterprise customers to develop large-scale, latency-sensitive applications at the edge.”

When paired with 5G, MEC will enable next-generation technologies like virtual reality, self-driving cars, and improvements in everything from health care to how we watch sports.

Verizon said it plans to expand 5G MEC to more cities this year, as well as extend its 5G network to even more locations throughout the U.S.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Allison Matyus is a general news reporter at Digital Trends. She covers any and all tech news, including issues around social…

Mobile

How fast is 5G? What you need to know about 5G speeds

OnePlus Nord N300 5G speed test.

Cellular carriers around the country are doing everything they can to expand their 5G coverage networks. Millions of people are already covered by a 5G tower in their area, and more are scheduled to arrive throughout 2024 -- bringing increased speeds to folks everywhere from the biggest city to the most remote mountain town. Nearly all modern smartphones now support 5G, making it the new standard for wireless devices.

That means anyone with an iPhone 15 or Galaxy S24 has a phone capable of accessing 5G networks -- but how fast is 5G? And is it noticeably faster than 4G speeds? There are a lot of benefits to 5G networks, but they're not without their growing pains. And like its predecessor, your mileage may vary based on how many people are using the same towers as you or how far away you are from the nearest access point.

Mobile

Have T-Mobile? Your 5G service is about to get much faster

U.S. map illustrating T-Mobile's 5G Ultra Capacity network expansion.

T-Mobile’s 5G network already offers unmatched 5G speeds and coverage throughout the U.S., with 98% of the population covered by some flavor of T-Mobile’s 5G and more than 90% benefiting from its higher-speed 5G Ultra Capacity (5G UC) network.

That translates to the “Uncarrier” taking first place in 5G performance in 46 U.S. states. However, T-Mobile isn’t content to sit at 90% coverage. It’s been working steadily to increase the footprint of its 5G UC network to reach even further, and is bringing those top speeds to areas previously served only by its lower-frequency 5G Extended Range network.
A ‘Massive 5G Boost’

Mobile

Your next phone could get a huge 5G upgrade, thanks to AI

Qualcomm Snapdragon X80 Modem-RF chip.

It’s that time of year again when Qualcomm ushers in its next generation of 5G modem technology. Announced at Mobile World Congress (MWC ) 2024, this year’s Snapdragon X80 5G Modem-RF system is the successor to last year’s Snapdragon X75, and it builds on the 5G Advanced foundation laid last year with more raw power and new AI features.

While the Snapdragon X75 moved the needle by adding support for the latest 5G Advanced standards, we’re still in that fourth phase of 5G technology, otherwise known as 3GPP Release 18 — and most carrier networks are still catching up. So, with no new standards to embrace, Qualcomm has focused on improving the inside of the Snapdragon X80 to take even fuller advantage of these cutting-edge 5G technologies.
The magic of AI-powered 5G