5G Connections Predicted to Reach 1.01 Billion in 2023

The number of 5G connections are expected to grow from around 10 million in 2019 to 1.01 billion in 2023, according to a new report from IDC. That represents a compound annual growth rate of 217.2% over the 2019-2023 period.

IDC believes 5G will account for 8.9% of all mobile device connections by 2023. It points to several factors which will help drive adoption:

● Data Creation and Consumption. The amount of data created and consumed by consumers and businesses will continue to grow over the coming years. Shifting data-intensive users and use cases to 5G will allow network operators to more efficiently manage network resources, improving performance and reliability as a result.


● More Things Connected. As the IoT continues to proliferate, the need to support millions of connected endpoints at the same time will become increasingly critical. With the ability to enable an exponentially denser number of simultaneous connections, 5G's densification advantage be key for mobile network operators in providing reliable network performance.

● Speed and Real-Time Access. The speed and latency that 5G enables will open up the door for new use cases and add mobility as an option to many existing ones. Many of these use cases will come from businesses looking to leverage 5G's technological advantages in their edge computing, artificial intelligence, and cloud services initiatives.

"While there is a lot to be excited about with 5G, and there are impressive early success stories to fuel that enthusiasm, the road to realizing the full potential of 5G beyond enhanced mobile broadband is a longer-term endeavor, with a great deal of work yet to be done on standards, regulations, and spectrum allocations," said Jason Leigh, research manager for Mobility at IDC. "Despite the fact that many of the more futuristic use cases involving 5G remain three to five years from commercial scale, mobile subscribers will be drawn to 5G for video streaming, mobile gaming, and AR/VR applications in the near term."

More details in their full report linked below.


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