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The graphs below plot the past 18 months of ISED SMS monthly snapshots, by channel count (top), occupied spectrum (middle) and site count (bottom), for the three national (left) and four regional (right) carriers.
These graphs should trend upwards, to reflect the growing capacity and coverage of these carriers' wireless networks. However, Telus' see-saw graphs indicate a data issue, originating with Telus, ISED or both. Although December sees over 100,000 new Telus channels (green line in top-left graph), 10s of thousands of Telus channels remain missing from the most recent ISED SMS monthly snapshot.
Our data team fixes these and other issues to ensure Canada Cellular Services provides the most accurate representation of Canada's wireless landscape available.
| Site Counts | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Filter | Nov-22 | Dec-22 | Change | |||||||||
| Telus/Bell 5G | 87 | 698 | 611 | |||||||||
| 1.9 GHz | 22,784 | 23,360 | 576 | |||||||||
| AWS-1 | 29,619 | 30,056 | 437 | |||||||||
| 700 MHz B29 | 4,437 | 4,813 | 376 | |||||||||
| Telus Owned | 14,870 | 15,244 | 374 | |||||||||
| Telus/Bell LTE | 22,493 | 22,864 | 371 | |||||||||
| Metrocell | 9,590 | 9,958 | 368 | |||||||||
| 600 MHz | 4,954 | 5,180 | 226 | |||||||||
| 2.6 GHz | 12,450 | 12,665 | 215 | |||||||||
| Rogers 5G | 4,308 | 4,511 | 203 | |||||||||
| DAS | 6,657 | 6,851 | 194 | |||||||||
| Rogers LTE | 8,735 | 8,920 | 185 | |||||||||
| 700 MHz B12 | 13,857 | 14,011 | 154 | |||||||||
| 700 MHz B13 | 9,492 | 9,624 | 132 | |||||||||
The image below illustrates three recent improvements to the popular Best Sites feature:
Last summer, Telus, Rogers, Bell and 12 other licensees paid $8.9 billion to purchase 3500 MHz spectrum, to offer 5G cellular and fixed wireless service. Today, Canada Cellular Services adds Rogers' 3500 MHz spectrum, distributed across 1,093 sites and 3,237 channels, most with 60 - 80 MHz of bandwidth.
These 3500 MHz channels can carry 1,000+ megabits / second to the phone, exhausting a huge $175 100GB plan in 15 minutes and leaving the subscriber stranded in 1999, with 3G speeds for the rest of the month.
The 3500 MHz band plan (see below) allocates 20 unpaired 10 MHz blocks from 3450 - 3650 MHz. Some of these blocks were unable for purchase at auction, as they were and remain in use by incumbent licensees.
Since 2019, we've tracked 5G growth across Australia and Canada. Today, Canada Cellular Services welcomes Eastlink 5G, which launched four months ago with 18 sites in Halifax. Today, Eastlink operates 23 5G sites in Halifax and plans to extend coverage to Annapolis Valley, Sydney, Fredericton, Saint John and Charlottetown.
Eastlink 5G occupies blocks F and G (see below) across the three Maritime provinces, which they licensed for $13 million.
600 MHz provides the best reliability and reach of all 5G bands and is ideal for IoT service.
This table shows the growth of the Telstra 5G network across Australia, starting in May 2019:
| # Telstra 5G Sites | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Location | May-19 | Aug-19 | Nov-19 | Mar-20 | Nov-20 | May-21 | Oct-21 | May-22 | |
| Adelaide | 46 | 47 | 67 | 118 | 335 | 340 | 342 | 345 | |
| Brisbane | 63 | 115 | 131 | 181 | 525 | 538 | 678 | 686 | |
| Canberra | 38 | 38 | 45 | 48 | 110 | 123 | 124 | 126 | |
| Gold Coast | 54 | 62 | 72 | 83 | 120 | 127 | 84 | 84 | |
| Hobart | 16 | 21 | 36 | 36 | 44 | 47 | 48 | 48 | |
| Launceston | 7 | 9 | 11 | 11 | 47 | 47 | 47 | 47 | |
| Melbourne | 52 | 52 | 370 | 481 | 999 | 1,035 | 1,049 | 1,057 | |
| Perth | 43 | 49 | 85 | 106 | 326 | 352 | 354 | 358 | |
| Sydney | 64 | 75 | 238 | 347 | 1,085 | 1,153 | 1,167 | 1,199 | |
| Toowoomba | 25 | 25 | 26 | 26 | 31 | 30 | 33 | 33 | |
| Other | 35 | 133 | 142 | 569 | 599 | 513 | 544 | ||
| TOTAL | 408 | 528 | 1,214 | 1,579 | 4,191 | 4,391 | 4,439 | 4,527 | |
Also, there are 2,342 and 2,539 NBN and TPG broadband sites, respectively, across major urban centers from Perth to Brisbane.
You can see Telstra or Optus 5G sites, Telstra IoT, NBN, TPG and more at Australia Cellular Services.
81% of Telus' national network disappeared from this month's ISED SMS snapshot. (Does this meet the requirement to submit technical information associated with radiocommunication installations on a monthly basis? )
The random variations in Telus' network shown below represent uncorrected ISED SMS snapshots. We don't use uncorrected SMS snapshots as-is — and neither should you. Please contact us for help in this area.
Last year we asked Is Canada behind on 5G? Today, the answer remains yes.
ENCQOR 5G is a provincial / federal initiative to develop 5G applications. But this initiative will be for not if 5G plan prices remain in the stratosphere and capacities remain in the basement. Canada's unlimited 5G plans are unlimited only in the claims made and not the value delivered.
This recent 5G mmWave test in San Jose California (and captured at right) shows an iPhone 12 Pro downloading at speeds above 3 gigabits per second — more than double the speed of fiber-to-the-home internet.
At this speed, an $80 Canadian unlimited plan would use all its monthly data — in under one minute! (At least there's SMS to keep you connected.)
One year ago, we compared high capacity plans across Canada and Australia. One year later, Canadian plans have not changed, by one dollar or one bit: $175 for 100G (Rogers); $100 for 50G (Telus). And throttling policies remain unchanged (and unusable): 0.5 megabits / second.
In contrast, Australia plans have increased capacity and lowered prices: $55 for 300GB (Vodafone); $60 for 500GB (Optus). And throttling policies remain usable: 10 megabits / second.
Australia and Canada are of similar size and population. So, what's keeping Canadians from enjoying what Australia already has? Until we see significant price and capacity improvements, Canadian 5G remains only a marketing slogan.
We have documented many, many times how each update to Canada Cellular Services required us to first solve a jigsaw puzzle. It was a manual process, labor intensive, and sometimes overlooked a few sites.
This month brings a new workflow, that replaces the jigsaw puzzle with machine learning algorithms trained by our 15 years experience. The result is a more accurate account of Canada's wireless landscape, immune to the random variations of uncorrected ISED SMS files.
The graphs below measure Canadian macro and metrocell assets using uncorrected ISED SMS files from the past 18 months. Compare the dips and peaks with similar graphs for Australia which accurately reflect true growth in capacity and coverage.
In short, do not use uncorrected SMS files for any analysis of Canada's wireless networks. We don't and neither should you. Please contact us if you need help in this area.
Australia Cellular Services uses data published by ACMA, the nation's spectrum regulator. The graphs below chart this data for the past three years across three metrics: occupied spectrum, site and channel counts.
All graphs increase predictably, and accurately reflect the growth in both capacity and coverage of cellular service across Australia.
