T-Mobile and Sprint announce first markets to support their 5G networks

The 5G future is almost here.

The race to 5G seems to be heating up among U.S. carriers every single day, and during MWC 2018, T-Mobile and Sprint both announced their respective plans for rolling out their 5G networks over the next year.

Looking first at T-Mobile, the Un-Carrier says it'll begin building out 5G equipment this year in a total of 30 cities, with New York, Los Angeles, Dallas, and Las Vegas being among the first that'll be able to experience the increased speeds when 5G smartphones start coming out in 2019.

T-Mobile will be enabling more of its 600 MHz and millimeter wave spectrum to help prepare for its 5G coverage, and commenting on this news, Chief Technology Officer Neville Ray said –

Every dollar we invest in our network is a 5G dollar. All the LTE Advanced work we do is 5G work, and we're leading the industry with the most advanced LTE network in the country. Every step we take --- every innovation – builds toward a future-proof 5G network, one where our customers continue to come out on top.

As for Sprint, the carrier claims its customers in Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, and Washington D.C. will be able to "experience the future of wireless" starting this April. Sprint will offer these markets "5G-like capabilities", including the likes of faster speed and more capacity.

Sprint's targeting the first half of 2019 as the launch window for its 5G network, and between now and then, it'll start to utilize thousands of its Massive MIMO radios to prepare itself for this next evolution in mobile data.

This news comes shortly after AT&T announced similar plans, and all of this makes it clear that no one will stop until they're the first to market before everyone else. Who will win that race? Let me know who your money is on in the comments below.

These are three of the cities where AT&T's 5G network will launch in 2018