The Global mobile Suppliers Association (GSA) has confirmed the number of announced 5G devices has surpassed 900 for the first time and now stands at 938 announced 5G devices—an increase of 24.1 percent over the last quarter. The number of 5G devices understood to be commercially available has similarly grown, by 29.9 percent over the same period, now exceeds 600 for the first time, reaching 608 devices, which represents 64.8 percent of the total number of announced 5G devices. Of these commercial 5G devices, over 400 are phones.

The new “5G Device Ecosystem – August 2021” report reveals that 143 vendors have now announced available or forthcoming 5G devices. Across 22 different form factors, devices recorded by GSA include 450 5G phones, at least 401 of which are now commercially available (up 20 in a month). GSA also recorded 171 FWA CPE devices (indoor and outdoor), of which 67 are now commercially available.

By end-July 2021, GSA had identified:

• 22 announced form factors
• 143 vendors who had announced available or forthcoming 5G devices
• 938 announced devices (including regional variants, but excluding operator-branded devices that are essentially rebadged versions of other phones), including 608 that are understood to be commercially available:
          o  450 phones (up 19 from June), at least 401 of which are now commercially available (up 20 in a month
          o    171 FWA CPE devices (indoor and outdoor), of which 67 are now commercially available
          o    134 modules
          o    60 industrial/enterprise routers/gateways/modems
          o    43 battery operated hotspots
          o    17 tablets
          o    15 laptops (notebooks)
          o    10 in. vehicle routers/modems/hotspots
          o    38 other devices (including drones, head-mounted displays, robots, TVs, USB terminals/dongles/modems, cameras, femtocells/small cells, repeaters, vehicle OBUs, a snap-on dongle/adapter, a switch, a vending machine and an encoder)
          o    528 announced devices with declared support for 5G standalone in sub-6 GHz bands, 365 of which are commercially available

The full report, available to all GSA Members and Associates subscribing to the GAMBoD service, includes additional data including the growth in 5G FWA CPE and 5G phones, the spectrum support of 5G devices and a full list of the 511 commercially available 5G devices. 

“Phones and indoor/outdoor FWA CPE continue to be the most prevalent 5G devices, and the number of announced devices in each of these categories grew strongly throughout 2020 and this has continued in the first half of 2021,” commented Joe Barrett, president, GSA.  “A year ago there were 90 vendors who had announced 5G devices, today this ecosystem has grown to be over 140, across form factors that serve the consumer, business and industrial markets. As we see more spectrum allocated to 5G services and more networks launched, so we can expect to see this device momentum to continue to grow, such that we might expect to see the number of commercial devices surpassing the 650 mark by the end of Q3 2021.”