Summary
- 5G support on mobile devices can make you more productive by ensuring a reliable and constant connection, saving time and effort.
- Adding cellular support to slim laptops is easier than ever with the emergence of eSIM technology, offering new possibilities in terms of functionality.
- The holdup with 5G laptops may be due to limited availability in flagship models and the lack of options from top brands, but it's time for cellular connectivity to become a standard offering in 2023.
5G connectivity has become commonplace in 2023, with even budget devices offering support for the wireless standard in some cases. Before that, a slew of mobile electronics supported some type of cellular connectivity. It started with mobile phones, of course, but then stretched to tablets and even smartwatches. But there's a natural next step to the emergence of cellular connectivity across mobile electronics, and it's taking longer than expected.
Thin-and-light laptops should have 5G in 2023, but only a select few great laptops offer that connectivity. I daily-drive the Lenovo Yoga Book 9i, and the feature is sorely missed. Here's why it makes a big difference, and why there might be some resistance about bringing 5G to laptops across the board.
5G support can make you more productive
The proposition for 5G connectivity on mobile devices, like smartphones and smartwatches, is quite simple. You need to be connected to the digital world at all times, and want that connection available either on your wrist or in your pocket. It's a bit different for tablets, since they are secondary devices for most people and most don't feature cellular support by default. The use case there is that you don't want to spend time fiddling around with a mobile hotspot or finding a Wi-Fi network when you need to do something on your tablet. Having a great iPad or a quality Android tablet with cellular means that you never have to worry about not having a connection, and it can save you time that you would have spent trying to get connected.
5G support on slim laptops, like the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 11, offers the same possibilities for your mobile workstation. There are times when your phone or tablet won't cut it, and you need to pull out your laptop to get work done. When this happens, most of us either try to find a public Wi-Fi network or connect to a personal hotspot from our smartphones. But both of these solutions are flawed, as public Wi-Fi networks can be unsafe or slow and mobile hotspots can result in slow speeds or extra data charges. By having 5G built into your laptop, you can cut out all the doubt and ensure you'll always have a connection. Thin-and-light laptops are portable enough nowadays to be taken anywhere — an M2 MacBook Air is thinner than a cellular iPad Pro with a Magic Keyboard — so cellular compatibility is a must.
Adding cellular support is easier than ever
With the emergence of eSIM on mobile devices, like modern iPhones, it's clear that adding cellular connectivity to laptops isn't an unreasonable ask. Sure, you have to add a 5G modem and some antennas, which does add some cost to the device's bill of materials and might require some more research and development. But now that eSIM is prevalent, there's no need to add a SIM card tray or rethink a laptop's design. An eSIM chip is a tiny addition that would be impossible to see from the outside, but would offer a ton of new possibilities in terms of functionality for laptops.
If laptop manufacturers are concerned that not everyone will want 5G support, there's a solution for that too. Most tablets with 5G support offer the functionality as a premium feature that comes at an extra cost. That means the people who value 5G support can have it on their thin-and-light laptop of choice, but the people who don't want it won't need to pay extra. It's a balance that benefits just about everyone involved, from the consumer to the manufacturer.
What's the holdup with 5G laptops?
On paper, the holdup with 5G is due to meager sales of the current crop of laptops that offer the connectivity today. At least, that's what chip manufacturer Intel said when it exited the 5G laptop market earlier this year. However, I'm not sure that current sales are the best indicator of the demand for 5G laptops, because most flagship models don't offer that capability. There isn't a single Mac computer with 5G, and it's unlikely that a longtime Mac user will switch to Windows just for 5G compatibility. Even on the Windows side of things, the best thin-and-light laptops available don't offer 5G. It's niche sub-brands or business laptops that offer the functionality today, and that doesn't help grow the category.
The best of the best laptops don't offer 5G, and that's a shame. The dual-screen Lenovo Yoga Book 9i was good enough to make me switch from Mac to Windows, but it still doesn't have support for 5G. With laptops becoming more portable than ever, it's time that cellular connectivity becomes a standard offering in 2023.