Can 5G replace home broadband?
We ran a 5G home router alongside full fibre for six weeks. Here is where it held up, and where it quietly fell apart.
12 August 2026 · 9 min read · Signal Station Labs
5G home broadband is sold on peak speed. Peak speed is rarely the thing that decides whether a connection feels good to live with.
Across six weeks we logged throughput, latency and dropouts every fifteen minutes on a 5G fixed wireless router and a full fibre line in the same house. The 5G line was quicker than expected in the middle of the day and noticeably worse between 7pm and 10pm, when the local cell was carrying far more traffic.
Latency was the clearer difference. Fibre sat between 6 and 12 ms all day. The 5G line moved between 22 and 90 ms, with occasional spikes past 200 ms during busy periods. For video calls and games, that variability matters more than the raw download figure.
Where 5G won was flexibility. No installation date, no engineer, no minimum term. If you rent, move often, or are waiting for fibre to reach your street, that is a real advantage.
Our conclusion: treat 5G home broadband as an excellent stopgap and a decent primary connection in a strong-signal home with light evening demand. If several people work from home, fibre is still the safer choice where it is available.
Method note
Figures in this piece come from Signal Station Labs measurement. Where a result depends heavily on location we say so rather than reporting a single number as universal.
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