Innovation
From 1G to 6G: 40 Years That Rewired the World
As wireless networks mark four decades of evolution, the next generation promises not just faster speeds but a network that actively senses, computes, and reasons about the world around it.
Key Takeaways
- Forty years of wireless evolution has delivered roughly tenfold throughput improvements per generation
- 4G enabled the platform economy through mobile broadband, transforming retail, transport, and media
- 5G mid-band is delivering real performance gains while millimeter-wave deployment remains limited
- 6G aims to add active sensing and distributed AI computation to the network itself, not just faster data
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DT Editorial AI··via spectrum.ieee.org