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NOVEMBER 2019 I PCB007 MAGAZINE 49 of 5G's most important features (more on this later). This makes the technology suitable for applications that require rapid responsiveness and no lag, such as those mentioned earlier. 5G technology can demonstrate latency as low as one millisecond with reported realistic es- timates in the range of 1–10 milliseconds. 5G is reported to be 60 times faster or more, and perhaps up to 120 times faster, than present average 4G latency. While researching data for this update, and looking at the new standards defining 5G, it seems that, theoretically, data rates can hit 20 Gbps download and 10 Gbps upload; in other words, those are very fast data speeds. Now, remember that these impressive num- bers are theoretical rates. We can expect that the specifications of 100 Mbps download and uploads of 50 Mbps are being expected, but we will see. Key Features The possibilities are almost endless with 5G, so let's look at the key features. 5G technology: • Has a reported latency of only one milli- second (latency is the time it takes for the data to go from the point of transmission to the point of origin), which is a signifi- cant improvement • Can increase the number of devices connected by 10x to 100x; therefore, this opens up the possibility of having 50,000 million connected devices simultaneously • Has very high levels of network availability • Has a very low chance of network overload • Will make it possible to have 99.9% coverage • Will enable an internet of things (IoT) device to have a 10-year, low-power life • Will provide greatly increased speeds up to 10 GB per second • Will lower energy consumption; it is reported, but not yet verified, that 5G will reduce energy consumption in the network by up to 90% • And 5G devices should be compatible with the newer security standards Along with these key features, many more will most likely be announced in the coming year. The Future of 5G Overall, we can expect that 5G in the real world will give us the aforementioned low la- tency, be efficient, and reportedly be able to switch to a low-energy state within millisec- The changing mobile landscape from 4G to 5G.