India 5G and 6G evolution marks new era of connectivity

India is leading the global 5G adoption movement, marking a significant milestone in its digital transformation journey. Since the rollout of 5G in 2022, India has deployed over 4,78,000 5G cell sites across the country as of April 2025. 5G services are now available in every state and union territory, serving a growing base of 250 million active 5G subscribers.

The country has adopted both standalone (SA) and non-standalone (NSA) deployments, utilising L, S, and Mid-band frequency bands. By 2030, this number is projected to rise to an impressive 970 million, making up 74% of all mobile connections in the region. This rapid rollout is revolutionising sectors such as healthcare, education, and agriculture, while also bridging the digital divide in rural and underserved areas.

Despite this rapid progress, the full potential of 5G has yet to be realised. While mobile broadband is the primary 5G service available today, the technology has the capacity to support a range of advanced capabilities such as Ultra-Reliable Low-Latency Communications (URLLC) and massive Machine-Type Communications (mMTC). These features are still in the early stages of commercialisation, and their widespread adoption is expected to unfold in the coming years. As the 5G market continues to evolve, new business opportunities and regulatory frameworks will emerge, shaping the future of wireless technology.

Meanwhile, the industry is already looking ahead to the next phase of connectivity—5G Advanced and, ultimately, 6G. With multiple waves of 5G deployments and upgrades still ahead, the ICT sector, academia, and standardisation bodies are already investing in the technologies that will power the next generation of wireless communications beyond 5G.

5G Advanced: Enhancing Today’s Network

5G Advanced is the next stage in the evolution of 5G technology, designed to enhance and extend the capabilities of 5G networks. It is part of the ongoing 5G development roadmap, aiming to deliver differentiated services with advanced features, improve network efficiency, and incorporate energy efficiency and Artificial Intelligence (AI) applications.

5G-Advanced is poised to unlock the full potential of 5G, delivering its richest capabilities. It will create a foundation for more demanding applications and a wider range of use cases than ever before, with a truly immersive user experience based on extended reality (XR) features. It will also introduce AI and ML enhancements across the Radio Access Network (RAN), Core, and network management layer for improved performance, network optimisation, and energy efficiency. It will also be fully backward compatible, so it will be able to co-exist with the current 5G NR Releases, including the ability to serve legacy 5G devices.

5G Advanced provides a range of capabilities that can help operators generate more revenue, reduce operating costs, and enhance user experience. It enables revenue generation through differentiated connectivity and new services, such as Reduced Capability (RedCap), which operates at a fraction of 5G bandwidth, targeting next-gen IoT devices. At the same time, it helps lower operational expenses by allowing a higher level of automation and energy optimisation.

Furthermore, 5G Advanced enhances the user experience by supporting differentiated services (DiffServ) and enabling RAN slicing within existing 5G networks. These capabilities unlock additional capacity, offer greater flexibility in technically demanding deployments, and enhance device performance, ultimately ensuring a higher quality of service (QoS) for end-users.

5G Advanced enhances the user experience by supporting differentiated services (DiffServ) and enabling RAN slicing within existing 5G networks. 

5G-Advanced will enable new services beyond traditional communication by introducing enhanced positioning with sub-10 cm accuracy consistently both indoors and outdoors, as well as time synchronisation as a service. 5G-Advanced offers valuable benefits of differentiated service and delivers potential use cases as diverse as smart power grid control, industrial automation, and real-time financial transactions. This will enhance navigation and make logistics systems more efficient.

It is also slated to extend the reach of connectivity and make it available to new market segments, including innovations for improved coverage, enhanced low-cost massive Internet of Things, and further support for non-terrestrial networks (NTN) and drones. This will help bridge the digital divide by extending broadband connectivity into rural and underserved geographies, offering people access to economic opportunities and the life-changing benefits of mobile connectivity. It will also be fundamental to the operation of driverless cars, autonomous robots, and industrial automation systems.

5G Advanced is expected to begin rolling out by late 2025, with significant improvements anticipated by 2026. It will serve as a critical bridge between the current 5G and the eventual leap to 6G, enabling telecom operators and users to experience enhanced connectivity and improved services as we enter the next decade.

6G Vision: Building on a 5G Foundation

The evolution from 5G and 5G Advanced to 6G will be a gradual progression, with the completion of the standardisation process expected by 2029. The first deployments of 6G are anticipated around 2030. Learnings from 5G Advanced networks and interactions with user ecosystems will continuously inform the research, standardisation, and development of 6G standards.

Capturing the evolution of technology, alongside advancements in hardware capabilities, is critical to fostering the mature development of 6G standards, delivering both enhanced and new network capabilities, while ensuring cost-efficient and sustainable solutions. It is expected that 6G will be built on the foundations of 5G SA and 5G Advanced (see IMT-2030 Activity Timeline).

6G is expected to build on the existing capabilities of 5G while introducing a range of new features that will enable the development of next-generation applications (see IMT-2030 Palette Diagram). Key advancements, including expanded coverage, enhanced sensing capabilities, AI integration, and precise positioning, will form the foundation of 6G networks. These essential features and capabilities will drive innovation across multiple domains, transforming the way networks operate and interact with the physical world.

Spectrum requirements and band allocation: Spectrum allocation forms the foundational step in the development of 6G. After extensive deliberations, the majority of researchers have identified the centimetre wave (cmWave) band, ranging from 3 GHz to 30 GHz, as the preferred spectrum for 6G, rather than the lower millimetre wave (mmWave) band, which spans 30 GHz to 100 GHz. This preference is primarily driven by the stability of the manufactured handset and the operational coverage possible in the cmWave range. Global experience with mmWave for handsets has revealed limitations in terms of coverage and data rate achieved, resulting in relatively sparse deployments worldwide.

GSMA has recommended that cellular operators in India be allocated 500 MHz of spectrum for a 100 Mbps experience, up from the 100 MHz available under 5G.

In the Indian context, the GSMA has recommended that each cellular operator be allocated 500 MHz of spectrum—an increase from the 100 MHz typically available under 5G—necessitating a total of 2 GHz of spectrum to be reserved for 6G services to ensure a 100 Mbps user experience. For specific details on proposed bands within the Indian telecom landscape, refer to the Spectrum Prism.

Going ahead, it is anticipated that 6G will continue to rely on 5G mid-band spectrum (around 3.5 GHz) to meet coverage requirements. For higher capacity needs, the focus will likely shift to the so-called Golden Band, spanning from 7.1 GHz to 14.8 GHz. In the interim, telecom operators in India may utilise the upper 6 GHz band (6.4 GHz to 7.1 GHz) to support the deployment of 5G Advanced capabilities.

Enhanced architecture and interoperable design: The design of 6G will be guided by thorough due diligence, rather than being driven solely by peak performance metrics, such as throughput targets (e.g., 100 times the capabilities of 5G). It will focus on enabling localised, use case-specific deployments that offer tailored 6G services. These deployments will support native applications to meet regulatory requirements.

A key architectural objective is the integration of open interfaces within the 6G RAN, as being standardised by 3GPP, to facilitate interoperability across vendors. 6G is intended to be business-driven and designed to coexist with legacy 5G networks. It will support deployment within existing 5G spectrum bands and enable Multi-RAT Spectrum Sharing (MRSS), a concept similar to Dynamic Spectrum Sharing (DSS) used today for the coexistence of 4G and 5G RANs.

On the core network side, 6G will require software upgrades to the existing 5G Core to support new 6G Radio Access Technologies (RAT) alongside 5G RAT. Overall, 6G aims to simplify network deployment through flexible architectural options and backwards compatibility.

Boosting capacity with lower TCO: A 6G network is expected to enable the sustainable expansion of infrastructure with minimal changes to the existing hardware ecosystem. This can be achieved through upgrades to more efficient software systems, incorporating AI-enabled optimisations across the network.

A key feature of 6G will be cloud-based processing—both in the RAN and Core segments—which will reduce dependency on physical infrastructure. The ability to expand capacity through cost-effective upgrades, improved coverage, and efficient spectrum sharing will be one of 6G’s most distinctive advantages in driving down total cost of ownership (TCO).

A key feature of 6G will be cloud-based processing—both in the RAN and Core segments—which will reduce dependency on physical infrastructure. 

Enabling ubiquitous 6G connectivity: 6G aims to provide continuous, reliable, and stable communication everywhere—truly ubiquitous connectivity. This goal requires optimal and effective radio planning for deployment, along with the integration with the space segment in the form of Non-Terrestrial Networks (NTN). Inherently merged with terrestrial telecom infrastructure, NTNs will ensure seamless and dependable coverage, especially in underserved and remote areas.

AI-native capabilities in 6G networks: AI will be embedded in 6G from inception, forming an organic component of the network architecture. It will be native in the management, control, and user planes of the 6G network. The network will also act as a platform for enabling APIs in a multi-party ecosystem, with holistic automation of both networks and services as a central design objective.

Sustainable and energy-efficient networks: Sustainability will be a foundational principle in the design of 6G networks. It will focus on enhancing energy efficiency through upgraded channel coding and modulation techniques in the RAN and incorporating energy-efficient traffic shaping algorithms within the Core. Efficient radio interfaces and dynamic network load balancing will help reduce the high-power consumption levels currently seen in 5G networks, positioning 6G as a truly green network.

Enhanced security for the Quantum era: With the advent of post-quantum computing, enhanced security readiness is crucial. 6G is expected to incorporate blockchain technologies to encrypt data payloads and apply quantum encryption to secure packet headers. These measures will be crucial in safeguarding data against emerging cyber and network threats. Additionally, 6G architecture will be designed to accommodate national-level security and privacy regulations, making compliance an integral component of network deployment.

New use cases and monetisation models: Each generation of mobile technology builds on the use cases of the previous one, and 6G is no exception. It will optimise and scale many of the innovations introduced by 5G, such as smart cities, connected farms, highways, railways and factories, autonomous vehicles, AR/VR/XR, digital twins, and industrial automation, while also introducing entirely new applications.

Notably, use cases for 6G are expected to be identified and planned from the outset, unlike in 5G, where monetisation pathways are still evolving. This planning aims to ensure that 6G delivers meaningful value across diverse sectors by accelerating adoption and reducing implementation costs.

Integrated sensing and location identification: 6G will also introduce integrated sensing capabilities within the RAN to monitor environmental parameters, including weather, temperature, and humidity. These data will feed into the AI engine in the core network, enabling predictive analytics and proactive network behaviour. Additionally, 6G networks will offer the ability to determine user location independently of GPS satellites, using intelligent algorithms to enhance precision and reliability in positioning services.

Way Ahead: From Design to Deployment

The design and standardisation of 6G networks will focus on simplifying today’s complex architectures while integrating advanced capabilities such as AI, intelligent automation tools, and open, easily integrable systems. These networks will also prioritise energy efficiency and enhanced capacity. Rather than overhauling existing hardware, 6G aims to build on current infrastructure through software upgrades and minor hardware enhancements, making the transition more cost-effective and practical.

Crucially, 6G will be inherently compatible with Non-Terrestrial Networks (NTN), reinforcing the vision of ubiquitous, seamless connectivity. As the technology matures, telecom operators and end-users alike stand to benefit significantly from the implementation of 6G, which is expected to become a reality within the next few years.

The author is an expert in defence communication strategies. He is an Army veteran with 24 years of experience designing, planning, and operating tactical and strategic defence communication networks for the Indian Army in difficult terrains in counter-insurgency and high-altitude warfare scenarios.