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EE Adds Over 150 New UK Locations to its 5G Mobile Network

Wednesday, Nov 23rd, 2022 (9:30 am) - Score 8,776
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Mobile operator EE (BT) has today announced that they’ve extended the coverage of their ultrafast 5G based (mobile broadband) network to more than 150 new locations across the United Kingdom, including various Christmas markets and places such as Kettering, Carlisle, Portlethen and Merthyr Tydfil etc.

At present, EE’s 5G network already covers over 50% of the UK’s population (here), which typically involves the use of various different radio spectrum bands, such as 3.4-4GHz, 2100MHz and 700MHz (the chosen bands may differ between mast sites).

The operator usually only announces new locations as being live if they have a minimum population of 10,000 people, within which they must also be delivering 5G coverage to “at least a third of that local population as well as the centre of the location” (some of their rivals announce locations despite only having the smallest of coverage).

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The 150 new locations being announced today, which are being covered by 5G, stretch from Scunthorpe in Lincolnshire (England) to Pontypridd in Wales and Portlethen in Scotland. At the time of writting we don’t have a full list (we hope to be able to add this shortly), but the operator did list a summary of the more notable locations.

List of the New 5G Locations (Partial)

In England
Kettering
Retford
Saltford
Scunthorpe
Carlisle
Barrow-in-Furness
Crewe

In Scotland
Buckhaven
Cowdenbeath
Gorebridge
Saltcoats
Portlethen
Banchory
Ratho

In Wales
Milford Haven
Pontypridd
Pencoed
Ebbw Vale
Whitland
Merthyr Tydfil
Pentyrch

In addition, EE has also improved 5G coverage and capacity across a number of popular Christmas Markets within existing deployment locations.

Christmas Market 5G Upgrades

Birmingham (home to the Frankfurt Christmas market)
Edinburgh (home to the Edinburgh Christmas Market)
Nottingham (home to Winter Wonderland)
London Hyde Park (home to Winter Wonderland)
Manchester (home to various Christmas markets)
Bath (home of Bath Christmas Market)
Newcastle (home of Newcastle Christmas market)
Padstow (home of the Padstow Christmas Festival)
Belfast (home of the Belfast Continental Christmas market)
Lincoln (home of Lincoln Christmas market)

Greg McCall, Chief Networks Officer, BT Group, said: “There is nothing like the sights and smells of a Christmas market. This year, with more people expected to visit some of the nation’s major destinations, ensuring the availability of high capacity, super-fast connectivity is crucial for customers and traders alike. As we continue to invest in and expand our 5G network, we’re thrilled to be powering Christmas market destinations across more of the UK.”

UPDATE 10:54am

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Sadly, EE has declined to provide a full list of the 150 new locations, which is a shame since they’ve had no trouble doing this in the past.

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Mark-Jackson
By Mark Jackson
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook and .
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34 Responses

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  1. Avatar photo Ad47uk says:

    3 wants to put a 5G mast up not far from me, no doubt they will be given the permission, I still see little point in 5G for mobiles to be honest.

    1. Avatar photo Matt says:

      Which is your opinion, The 5G networks are in much better shape for some vendors, 3 Included. Their customers will be plenty happy a 5G mast appears (including home broadband users) because they’ll get generally better latency and speed.

      I don’t see how better service can be derided as a problem.

    2. Avatar photo Ad47uk says:

      I can understand why some people may want 5G for home broadband if they can’t get Fibre, but why do people need all that speed for phones? 4G here is faster than my home broadband, and for a phone I think that is ample. Need to sort out the blank spots of 4G before mucking around with 5G.

      People around here where the mast is going will either have access to fibre or will be able to get access to fibre soon, so no need for super high speed 5G. Where it is going is close enough for me to be honest, less than half a mile as the crow flies. Considering how bad 5G is sometimes in reliability, I doubt many people are going to get much of a benefit from it inside.

    3. Avatar photo Doubleagent2022 says:

      5G download speeds are faster than 4G downloads on phones obviously but it speeds up Google play app updates and the apple iphone store apps faster.

      On 4G plus on EE on my phone I’m getting over 300 Mbps fast enough to update my phone apps on my s20fe 5G .

    4. Avatar photo DaveIsRight says:

      “It updates my phone apps faster” has to be one of the weakest and most infantile reasons for faster phone links I think I’ve ever seen. That’s a RIDICULOUS reason to want/need a faster connection. If you have 100 apps and they’re all over 100meg and all update daily thats still only 10GB a day.

      Seriously I wonder about peoples sanity when how fast their phone apps update occupies any of their day.

    5. Avatar photo Ad47uk says:

      @DaveIsRight and Doubleagent2022.

      I understand what you are saying, but most updates happen automatically, so you would not even notice. Also, I would think most people set their phone to update when connected to Wi-fi, I would not want to use mobile data to update my apps and phone.

  2. Avatar photo Simon says:

    Great, but what I really wish they would do is fill in the not-spots first. Many rural areas of Yorkshire and Cumbria without any type of coverage still in 2022.

  3. Avatar photo Dwayne Mitchell says:

    Has EE Forgotten about Northern Ireland?

    1. Avatar photo JG says:

      Yes, they don’t care about this part of the world. Their reception in rural areas here is already abysmal and they are showing no signs of improving it. Northern Ireland just seems to be an inconvenience for EE.

    2. Avatar photo DHCPv6 says:

      Perhaps you could try talking to these guys who did a talk on building the UK’s 5th MNO to address rural connection issues. Thy might actually consider Northern Ireland as their next project

      https://teletresearch.com

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Uv8gQ7r3dk

  4. Avatar photo anon says:

    EE: Put 1 mast in this town and say it’s done.

  5. Avatar photo Owen Rudge says:

    5G went live in Banchory some months ago – before that I was getting 4G speed tests of 150-200Mbps, now I get 5G speed tests of around 100Mbps max, and 4G similar!

  6. Avatar photo David W says:

    > EE has also improved 5G coverage and capacity across a number of popular Christmas Markets […] London Hyde Park (home to Winter Wonderland)

    They have literally zero temporary infrastructure at Winter Wonderland, and are close to unusable alongside Three. O2/VF are the only networks which are performing well there.

  7. Avatar photo David says:

    I’ve got my phone forced to stay on 4G. Even outside with line of sight to the masts the 5G data speeds on both EE and Three are slower than 4G whilst stood in the same spot. 5G coverage indoors is not useable. EE/Three replaced their local 4G mast with a new 5G one and 4G data speeds immediately dropped from about 40 Mbps to 2-3 Mbps at best.

    1. Avatar photo Jon says:

      No 4G masts are being replaced with 5G – that’s just nonsense. What happens is that 5G technologies are added to existing sites that are already carrying 4G. Quite often additional 4G techs are added at the same time.

  8. Avatar photo MilesT says:

    Per EE coverage checker, not yet following Three to enable 5G in Holt, Norfolk (they share a mast). Three’s rollout as mentioned on ISP review a few months back (and I still have the figurative bruised from falling off my chair when I say that post)

    1. Avatar photo mike says:

      EE only has a tiny patch of 5G in Norwich. If they can only do a half-arsed job in the city there’s not much hope for the smaller towns in Norfolk.

  9. Avatar photo Cheesemp says:

    I’d just like a decent 4G signal please EE. Its not like I live in the middle of nowhere (Small town a few miles from Southampton) but 4G signal is patchy at best (EE, 3) and unusable at worse (Voda, O2). I wouldn’t mind but all the signal maps said it 4G is good indoors and out. 8Mb outdoors, 1Mb indoors if it works is not good. I live in a standard 70s brick build house too. Can’t even get a smart meter without an aerial on the side of the house…

    1. Avatar photo yeehaa says:

      Hopefully with the decommissioning of 3G and transition to 4G/5G, signal reception will improve. Of course receiving a signal is only part of the solution, proper optical connections for back-haul at the masts must be done in tandem. Like many of the other comments, I sometimes find that when I do get a 5G signal, it is slower than a 4G connection.

  10. Avatar photo Phil says:

    UPDATE 10:54am

    Sadly, EE has declined to provide a full list of the 150 new locations, which is a shame since they’ve had no trouble doing this in the past.

    No surprised there

  11. Avatar photo Mike Hornett says:

    It’s about time a network provider updated our systems here in Towcester. It’s like we are just forgotten.

    1. Avatar photo DHCPv6 says:

      I was staying at a property on Watling Street last year for a few days and can 100% confirm that there was sod all indoor coverage on any network. Everybody else also had the same issue. Got me thinking about open access femto-cells that Vodafone, EE, Three or O2 SIMs could happily roam with no issue for such cases.

      Then again, it might never happen unless someone such as Telet gets involved with an open source type solution with DIY in mind e.g. a Raspberry Pi with Software Defined Radio. You could even potentially sell a pre-configured version for those not interested in the DIY approach, although it would of course be abit niche.

      Before anybody mentions it, yes – I know you can use WiFi for calling and texting too but is can be a arse ache when every property was like that & you’d need to connect to every WiFi network in the town

  12. Avatar photo Mike Robinson-Charlton says:

    I scrapped Virgin and now use Three 5G broadband router and obviously their 5g phone network. And in my personal opinion when I’m reaching 700Meg down and 150Meg up at peak times and paying £21 p/m and zero down time in 6 months I’m winning

    1. Avatar photo Mike Robinson-Charlton says:

      Obviously I fully understand I’m lucky to be near a 5G mast before I get the usual nonsense replys

  13. Avatar photo Audit Office says:

    Ebbw Vale?!

    5G coverage was paid for here using public money – DCMS and Welsh Assembly. How can this be listed as part of EE’s commercial rollout?

    I never knew how it got past the funding round, 5G market failure hasn’t even materialised to justify state intervention – or has it??

    https://uk5g.org/updates/read-articles/innovation-briefing-issue-9-project-roundup-wales-unlocked/

  14. Avatar photo Doubleagent2022 says:

    Nothing for Telford on EE 5G yet it could be the year 2026 by the time Telford gets any 5G coverage what a joke. Disappointing….

    1. Avatar photo chrisyyw9 says:

      Telford has had EE 5G for over a year…….

      Donnington
      Muxton
      Oakengates
      Madeley/Brookside
      Halesfield

    2. Avatar photo Doubleagent2022 says:

      Not in dawley is where I am living .

  15. Avatar photo Jamie says:

    I think this is a little… fishy..

    Carlisle has had EE 5G for a couple of years now, however about 6 months they announced that it is a new enabled city. There was an article posted on here about how they wait till it has a decent coverage to call it.

    Part of this 150, appears to be double cities.. Or that’s the case in Carlisle…

  16. Avatar photo Ryan Arbuckle says:

    EE 4G here gives me 200Mbps+ – but they seem to only cover belfast for 5g, shame

  17. Avatar photo Vauk says:

    5G in UK is a scam.

  18. Avatar photo Shankar shrestha says:

    sadly when i use this fake voda phone internet i feel this is not good for people to use.so please everyone do cancel your voda phone internet.this voda phone doesn’t good work.i will give you 0 star.dam

  19. Avatar photo East Devon guy says:

    Still awaiting 5G here in rural East Devon, I’m with BT/EE and have a 5G Handset Huawei Mate 20X 5G. If I’m in Sidmouth, Exmouth, or Chard for the day I can obtain 5G and I do notice the slight speed increase in streaming and downloading. But Honiton, Axminster, Seaton, and Lyme Regis. 4G is patchy with alot of no signal areas, even in my local village 4G is pretty rubbish.

    5G roll-out seems to have slowed down over the past 2 years due to the ongoing geo political trade war with USA and China which is ultimately having a knock on effect here as telcos have to strip out all Huawei equipment by 2027 which is going to cost millions.

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