To be fair, the science behind it was real. 5G opened the door to high-frequency millimeter waves—those fancy data-carrying signals that could hypothetically beam a full Netflix season to your phone in a millisecond. But there’s a catch. Those waves don’t travel far. They get blocked by everything—walls, trees, the palm of your hand, your cat walking past the router. For 5G to work properly, we needed thousands of antennas on every street corner. That didn’t happen.
So most U.S. carriers just gave up and rolled out “non-standalone 5G”—a Frankenstein’s monster glued onto 4G infrastructure. And surprise, surprise: the performance is barely different. That little “5G” icon on your phone? It often just means a 5G tower is nearby. Not that you’re actually using it. Most people never noticed a difference. Some didn’t even know it happened.
And maybe the saddest part? Tech companies knew it wasn’t going to work. They knew it before the rollout. They knew that infrastructure would be a nightmare. But they went ahead anyway, because there was money on the table.
Follow the Money
U.S. carriers spent over $100 billion just to license 5G spectrum. Add in infrastructure costs, marketing budgets, and “5G-ready” everything, and you’re looking at one of the most expensive rollouts in telecom history.
But what did it actually generate?
Not much. Consumers didn’t rush to upgrade their plans. Prices didn’t spike. Monthly bills stayed flat or even dropped in some areas due to competition. If anything, the average consumer is more confused than ever about what 5G even is.
The real winners were the equipment manufacturers—Ericsson, Nokia, Huawei—who sold the antennas, the backend systems, and the promise. Telecom companies framed it all as a “global race,” urging politicians to act fast or risk falling behind China. It was the space race of our time… only the prize wasn’t clear. And five years later, we’re still waiting for the liftoff.
And let’s not forget the conspiracy chapter of this saga. The 5G rollout inspired more fear and misinformation than anything I’ve seen in my entire career. People claimed 5G was going to fry our brains. That it caused COVID. That it was a government surveillance tool. Opportunists sold anti-5G hats, stickers, and necklaces with “radiation protection”—none of which did anything except drain wallets.
And while the science was clear—5G radiation is no more dangerous than 4G, and arguably safer—the visible rollout of towers in neighborhoods fueled the paranoia. Because when technology promises everything but delivers nothing… people start looking for other explanations.
So Was 5G a Scam?
Look, calling it a scam might be too harsh. The tech is real. The physics checks out.
But the hype was industrial-strength marketing nonsense.
What we got was the most aggressively oversold update in recent memory. Not quite a con, but close enough to leave a bad taste. A flashy label slapped onto something barely functional—sold to a public who didn’t ask for it, and didn’t get what they were promised.
Maybe one day, we’ll get the real benefits—like network slicing, industrial automation, or remote collaboration that actually works. But for now? 5G is an icon on your phone. A label on a box of dreams we never got to open.
And now, as whispers of 6G begin to surface, I find myself asking:
Are we really going to fall for this again?
Because the future they promised with 5G sounded amazing.
It just never showed up.
