Verizon has slowly but surely been launching 5G service in smaller cities around the country, but its next city is set to be its biggest challenge yet. Verizon has announced that it will launch 5G in parts of New York City on September 26. According to the company, this include areas of uptown, midtown, downtown Manhattan, Brooklyn, the Bronx, and Queens.
As you would expect from a newly launched service, actual 5G reception is likely to be spotty — so don’t expect to get a blanket of solid 5G service around the city. Instead, you’ll likely connect to the service in certain areas on the street, and it you’re lucky, that connection will last more than a few minutes.
With New York City in the mix, Verizon’s 5G service will be available in 11 cities around the U.S. Recently, the company also launched its 5G service in areas of Atlanta, Detroit, Indianapolis, and Washington. And it’s set to scale up that rollout a ton in the next few months — Verizon has said that it hopes to have 5G service available in 30 cities by the end of the year.
To get Verizon’s 5G service for yourself, you’ll first need to make sure that you have an actual 5G-compatible smartphone, like the Galaxy Note 10+ 5G or Galaxy S10 5G. You’ll also need to add 5G service to your Verizon plan, and that’ll likely cost you an extra $10 per month.
Because 5G service is still relatively spotty and there aren’t many 5G-compatible phones out there, we generally recommend holding off on buying a 5G phone and adding 5G service to your plan until next year at least. Many carriers have said that they’ll have nationwide 5G service available in 2020. Not only that, but it’s expected that a whole lot more smartphones will have 5G-compatibility in 2020. Apple, for example, is expected to launch its first 5G-compatible iPhone in September 2020.
Other carriers have been rolling out their 5G service too. AT&T, notably, appears to have 5G service available in more cities than any of its rivals, but AT&T’s 5G service is currently only available to business users.
