Telstra today announced its 5G network is now within reach of 75 per cent of the Australian population and its 4G network now covers more than two million square kilometres of the Australian continent.
There are now more than 1.5 million 5G devices on the Telstra 5G network.
And Telstra’s 5G network will also be improved with new technologies including low band 850Mhz and mmWave 26Ghz spectrum.
Telstra set an ambitious target last year and has achieved the goal of 75 per cent coverage before the end of June 2021 ahead of schedule.
“One of our priorities over the last year was bringing Telstra 5G to as many people as possible and this major milestone means that now three-quarters of Australians live where there is Telstra 5G,” says Telstra Group Executive Networks & IT Nikos Katinakis.
Telstra brought 5G services to more than 100 regional towns and cities in the last six months alone including Echuca-Moama, Castlemaine, Port Douglas, Yass, Murray Bridge, Devonport, and Esperance which takes the total to more than 200 towns and cities nationally.
“We’ve extended Telstra 5G well beyond the inner cities to our suburbs, regional centres and rural areas. We have almost three times the number of 5G sites as our nearest competition and nearly twice the amount of people covered,” Katinakis continued.
“While our competitors have largely been ignoring regional Australia, at least as far as 5G is concerned, we’ve been busy building a Telstra 5G network more regional Australians are using each and every day.
“We now have more than 1.5 million 5G devices live on our network and we’re adding thousands more every week as we continue switching on more 5G sites across the country.”
But Telstra hasn’t turned its back on 4G – it has also expanded the 4G network which now reaches 99.4 per cent of the population.
And the company says this coverage will continue to grow in the coming years to match Telstra’s current 3G footprint at 2.5 million square kilometres and reach of 99.5 per cent of the population.
Telstra’s 3G network will be switched off in 2024 -by then the Telstra 4G LTE network will be ready to take the hand-off.
Telstra’s partnership continues with Ericsson as it improves its 5G services including low band 850Mhz and mmWave.
“We’ve switched on Telstra 5G on low band 850MHz and our carrier aggregation technology means better connectivity for our customers on the fringe of 5G coverage areas and even greater in-building coverage,” Katinakis said.
Telstra has invested $277m to secure 1000Mhz of mmWave 26Ghz spectrum and there are already 50 live sites in use in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Gold Coast and Goulburn.
Katinakis said: “We see mmWave playing a critical role in the future not only as demand for data continues to grow but also as an enabler for new enterprise and consumer use cases.
“Low band spectrum is still extremely important, especially in regional and remote Australia, but mmWave will be the key to growing capacity and depth of coverage in our larger cities and towns.”
Telstra, in partnership with Ericsson, also revealed it made the world’s longest 5G Standalone data call over a distance of 113km from a Telstra commercial site in Gippsland, Victoria.
The 5G SA call used Telstra’s 850Mhz spectrum and Ericsson’s 5G SA network software.
