You see, the Columbus airport coverage only extends to parts of the main ticketing area — you can’t even use 5G at your gate. It’s not surprising given that ultra wideband 5G is short-ranged and sensitive to interference (it can’t cover a whole stadium just yet), but it could be a while before you can expect to use 5G the whole way through.

The deployment puts Verizon ahead of AT&T in terms of cities covered. Its arch-rival has launched 5G for everyday mobile users in 10 cities, although both are still well behind T-Mobile’s nationwide access (Sprint is still in nine cities). With that said, no one carrier has an unambiguous edge over the others. If Verizon’s current network is fast but fussy, T-Mobile’s very low-band 5G is far-reaching but only mildly faster than LTE. AT&T and Sprint, meanwhile, are somewhere in between with either a mix of high- and low-band 5G (AT&T) or middling frequencies (Sprint). It won’t be until 2020 or later that you see truly comprehensive coverage, and it’s not guaranteed to live up to the hype.