China's 5G-Advanced Rollout Reaches 330 Cities, Eyes AI-Native 6G

China's 5G-Advanced rollout has quietly become one of the most significant infrastructure stories of the decade. By the end of 2025, the technology had reached more than 330 cities across mainland China, with the number of active users crossing 10 million by mid-year, according to the GSMA's Mobile Economy China 2026 report. 

Major carriers China Mobile, China Telecom, and China Unicom have all launched commercial services, while operators in Hong Kong and Macau have followed suit. What began as an upgrade to existing 5G networks has now become the foundation upon which China's broader AI and 6G ambitions are being built.

5G Takes a Larger Share of China's Mobile Market

The GSMA report confirmed that 5G now accounts for 55% of all mobile connections in mainland China — a milestone that reflects both the scale of infrastructure investment and the speed at which consumers and businesses have adopted the technology.

Beyond raw subscriber figures, the report also tied mobile technologies and services to 7.2% of China's GDP in 2025, a figure equivalent to $1.5 trillion. Projections suggest that number could climb to $2.1 trillion by 2030, representing a compound annual growth rate of 7%.

China Telecom Shanghai Launches First Commercial AI Uplink Network

One of the more technically notable developments in the rollout came from China Telecom Shanghai, which the GSMA identified as the operator behind China's first commercial "5G-Advanced × AI massive-uplink network."

The deployment spans more than 5,000 upgraded sites and delivers peak uplink speeds of 1 Gbps, with sustained 20 Mbps uplink coverage across key urban zones. The build reflects a broader shift in how operators are thinking about network performance — not just download speeds for consumers, but upload capacity for AI systems, cloud platforms, and connected devices.

Ericsson's Mobility Report echoed this trend, noting that connected devices are increasingly expected to push data upward to cloud platforms rather than simply receive it. The report pointed to AI-enabled IoT devices, autonomous vehicles, humanoid robots, drones, and 5G-native laptops as examples of the enterprise applications driving this shift.

More Than Speed: How 5G-Advanced Is Being Used on the Ground

The GSMA report made clear that the real story of 5G-Advanced is not raw throughput. Operators are deploying the technology in stadiums, tourism sites, transport hubs, and live event venues, using enhanced uplink capabilities to create differentiated service packages and explore new ways to generate revenue from connectivity.

China Mobile has introduced premium service tiers for high-density events. China Telecom and China Unicom have been working on joint resource orchestration across shared infrastructure. Separately, China Telecom and ZTE have been piloting AI-based network allocation to manage traffic more efficiently.

A Wider Range of Devices Coming Online

The GSMA also noted that China's next phase of 5G development will involve connecting a broader mix of device categories. Wearables, industrial cameras, connected vehicles, drones, and asset-tracking hardware are all expected to become part of the network fabric.

Nokia has specifically linked 5G-Advanced's positioning and RedCap capabilities to enterprise use cases in asset tracking, industrial automation, logistics, automotive, and public safety — sectors where reliable, low-latency connectivity matters more than peak consumer speeds.

5G Americas has described 5G-Advanced — built on 3GPP Release 18 and subsequent releases — as a technical stepping stone toward 6G. Its white paper characterizes the standard as an extension of 5G Standalone that incorporates AI and machine learning, extended reality (XR), improved energy efficiency, and low-latency capabilities.

China Sets Its Sights on 6G While Consolidating 5G Gains

At the opening keynote of MWC Shanghai 2026, Zhong Zhihong, chief engineer at China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), said the country would press ahead with next-generation digital infrastructure development while continuing to advance 6G research.

Zhong framed the path forward in terms of a network evolution — from current dual gigabit infrastructure toward dual 10-gigabit networks. He also emphasized continued investment in 6G core technologies, standards development, and the industrial ecosystems needed to support them.

His remarks extended beyond connectivity. Zhong called for deeper integration of large language models into sectors such as agriculture, education, and healthcare, positioning communications infrastructure as a vehicle for broader AI adoption across the Chinese economy.

China Telecom Charts a Path to AI-Native 6G

Yue Wang, chief technologist at China Telecom, offered the most detailed technical vision of what comes next. Speaking at RCRTech's Telco AI Forum, Wang argued that future 6G networks will need to treat connectivity and computing as inseparable.

Wang described current telecom systems as fundamentally deterministic — built on predefined interfaces, rules-based logic, and engineer-designed control mechanisms. That architecture, she said, creates real limits on what AI can do within a network.

Her proposed framework for AI-native 6G spans three layers:

• Infrastructure layer — covering network, compute, storage, and AI resources

• Operational layer — handling optimization and orchestration

• Service layer — supporting AI-based applications and services

Wang said that simply adding AI on top of existing infrastructure is not enough. Today's networks were not designed for AI-ready data pipelines, closed-loop control systems, AI lifecycle management, or real-time autonomous decision-making. Meeting those requirements will take architectural change, not just software upgrades.

Balancing Telecom Reliability With AI Flexibility

Wang was careful to address what she described as a two-way challenge. On one side, AI systems deployed in live carrier networks must meet strict reliability standards — these are critical infrastructure environments, and uncontrolled or unpredictable AI behavior is not acceptable.

On the other side, telecom architectures need enough adaptability to actually benefit from AI-driven operations. Threading that needle, Wang said, is one of the central engineering problems the industry must solve.

She identified physical AI systems — including robotics and industrial automation — as among the most important future applications for AI-native 6G. In her view, the first concrete capability that will define 6G progress is joint orchestration of communications and computing resources, managed together rather than in separate silos.

Monetisation Remains a Persistent Challenge for Chinese Operators

Despite the scale of China's 5G infrastructure and the ambition of its 6G roadmap, near-term revenue growth is expected to remain modest. GlobalData analyst Hrushikesh Mahananda told RCR Wireless News that while China holds its position as the world's largest 5G market, structural headwinds continue to pressure margins.

Price competition among carriers, a maturing consumer market, and regulatory requirements to keep connectivity affordable are all keeping average revenue per user relatively flat. In response, Chinese operators have been shifting their focus toward enterprise customers.

Carriers are expanding into private 5G networks, cloud computing, edge services, and AI-enabled platforms. Industry-specific applications in manufacturing, mining, ports, healthcare, and transport are providing clearer business cases for network capabilities like low latency and network slicing — use cases where operators can charge more because the value delivered is more measurable.

[Source: telecomstechnews]