As per the figures from the Mobile Economy China 2026 report of GSMA, roll out of 5G-Advanced in China has reached more than 330 cities.
According to figures from the GSMA’s The Mobile Economy China 2026 report, RCR Wireless News said that by 2025 end, 5G-Advanced coverage in mainland China had expanded to more than 330 cities. By the middle of 2025, the number of 5G-Advanced users exceeded 10 million.
The report also said that 5G made up 55% of the mobile connections in China by 2025 end. Major operators such as China Mobile, China Telecom as well as China Unicom have begun offering commercial 5G-Advanced services across mainland China, whereas operators in Hong Kong and Macau have also entered the market.
China Telecom Shanghai has also launched what GSMA described as the first commercial 5G-Advanced × AI massive-uplink network of China. The rollout includes more than 5,000 refurbished sites, maximum uplink speeds of 1Gbps, and constant 20Mbps uplink coverage imajor urban areas.
Ericsson Mobility Report, has pointed towards rising demand for uplink capacity from AI, cloud as well as mobile services. The report said connected devices are anticipated to send far more data to cloud platforms. Examples of enterprise and industry include autonomous vehicles, AI-enabled IoT devices as well as humanoid droids, drones and 5G-native laptops.
5G-Advanced is not all about speed
The GSMA report said that operators are implementing 5G-Advanced in stadiums, tourism sites, transportation hubs and real-time events venues. These deployments were linked to improved uplink capacity, differentiated packages along with novel monetisation models, the report said.
5G Americas sees 5G-Advanced as one step on the technical path to 6G. Its white paper outlines 5G-Advanced based on 3GPP Release 18 and subsequent releases as an upgrade of 5G Standalone incorporating AI and machine learning, XR, enhanced energy efficiency as well as low-latency capabilities.
The GSMA report says that the next phase of 5G development in China will see a more diverse set of interconnected devices and traffic types,” said the GSMA report. Examples include industrial cameras, wearables, connected vehicles, drones, and asset tracking devices
It is well to be noted that Nokia has linked 5G-Advanced positioning as well as RedCap functionality to enterprise uses like industrial automation, asset tracking, logistics, automotive and public safety.
The GSMA also gave examples of more dynamic resource allocation in 5G-Advanced. These consist of the premium service packages from China Mobile for high-density events, China Telecom and joint resource orchestration work by China Unicom across shared infrastructure, and China Telecom and ZTE’s AI-based network allocation initiatives.
GSMA Intelligence said that operators who are investing in 5G Standalone along with 5G-Advanced are progressively focusing on experience-based consumer offerings, such as differentiated services as well as service assurance, with AI and core network intelligence utilized to improve network performance.
The GSMA report also forecast mobile technologies and services to represent 7.2% of China’s GDP in 2025, or $1.5 trillion. It projected the mobile sector to add $2.1 trillion by the end of the decade, at a CAGR of 7%.
China will continue to build next-generation digital infrastructure and at the same time also promote research on 6G, chief engineer at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of China, Zhong Zhihong, said at the opening keynote of MWC Shanghai 2026.
China needed to organize and develop new communications and computing networks including an evolution from dual gigabit networks to dual 10-gigabit networks, Zhong said. He also highlighted the continuing efforts in 6G core technologies, standards development and related industrial ecosystems.
The MIIT official additionally linked communications infrastructure to the implementation of AI in different sectors. He said they should be more integrated with sectors like agriculture, education and healthcare.
China Telecom names AI-native 6G
With the roll out of 5G-Advanced in China, future AI-native 6G networks will need to have tighter coordination of networking and computing resources, says chief technologist at China Telecom, Yue Wang.
Most telecom systems today are still built around deterministic architectures, Wang said at the Telco AI Forum from RCRTech. These systems are built on top of predetermined interfaces, rules-based logic, and control mechanisms.
AI-native networks should be considered spanning three layers, predominantly infrastructure and operations, as well as services, Wang said. The infrastructure layer comprises a network, compute, and storage as well as AI resources, whereas the operational layer is responsible for optimization as well as orchestration, and the service layer provides AI-driven services.
Connectivity alone will not be enough for future AI services, Wang said. They will also need compute resources along with latency adaptation to be handled along with the network.
There are limits to adding AI capabilities to present systems, since existing networks have not been built around AI workflows, added Wang. Current networks are not designed for AI-ready data, AI lifecycle management, closed-loop control, or real-time decision-making, she said.
Industry needs to be able to organize network and compute capacity together to promote new AI services, she said.
The GSMA gives instances of 5G-Advanced, such as dynamic network resource management, stronger uplink performance, and support for a more diverse mix of device categories. Wang’s 6G comments centered around the joint control over connectivity, intelligence, compute, and data as well as assurance capabilities.
Wang also said the shift will call for modifications from both the telecom and AI industries. Live carrier networks are essential infrastructure and cannot depend on uncontrolled decisions, so AI systems must satisfy telecom standards.
At the same time, she pointed out that telecom architectures must be adaptable enough to leverage AI-driven operations. This means making AI trustworthy enough to be used in telecom environments but also enabling network systems to provide more flexible control.
Wang pointed out the importance of AI-native 6G when it comes to future applications like robotics and industrial automation, which belong to physical AI systems. One of the first abilities needed for 6G networks will be the joint orchestration when it comes to communications and computing, she said.
Wang said the development of AI-native 6G will rely on whether networks are able to open up and integrate communication, compute, data, and intelligence as well as assurance capabilities for customers collectively.
Operators still struggle with 5G returns
China is still the largest 5G market in the world; however, the growth in revenue from mobile services is projected to be moderate, owing to structural as well as competitive pressures, added an analyst at GlobalData, Hrushikesh Mahananda, who told this to RCR Wireless News.
Price competition, market saturation, and regulatory demands in order to keep connectivity cost-effective keep affecting average revenue per user, Mahananda said. The operators are thus increasingly focusing on enterprise 5G applications as well as industrial digitalization.
Chinese carriers are also transitioning into private 5G networks, cloud computing, and edge services as well as AI-enabled platforms. Hrushikesh Mahananda says there are more obvious enterprise use cases when it comes to 5G capabilities like low latency, network slicing, etc. in areas such as mining, manufacturing, ports, and healthcare as well as transport, Mahananda said.