Samsung plans to bring 5G to India next year for a large-scale trial

India might be a heaven for Samsung's low-cost handsets, but thanks to the collaboration between the smartphone maker and the local carrier Reliance Jio, the 4G LTE solutions provided by Samsung are expected to reach 99 percent of India's population — almost 1.3 billion people — by November 7. Even more, the first large-scale 5G trial will be conducted in the country in just a few months as well.

This week, the Samsung-sponsored India Mobile Congress 2018 is taking place in New Delhi. In the opening of this event, Samsung announced that the aforementioned 5G trial is scheduled to take place in the first half of 2019, without mentioning an accurate date. However, it has been unveiled that the Indian Department of Telecommunications is Samsung's partner in this endeavor.

Samsung is currently showing 5G solutions for home broadband services, Smart Cities, and Smart Agriculture applications during the IMC 2018 event. Since the first 5G commercial service has recently went live in the US for just a few areas, India might have to wait at least one or two more years until the first 5G commercial services become available to home users. However, it will be interesting to find out more about this trial's challenges and results — if Samsung decides to make the results public, of course.