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6G Hype, Hard Questions: Why The Next “G” Demands Caution, Not Acceleration

The real risk of 6G is not that it will arrive too late, but that it will arrive too fast—before we have agreed on what problem it is meant to solve, and for whom.

6G Hype, Hard Questions: Why The Next “G” Demands Caution, Not Acceleration
Photo by He Junhui / Unsplash

By Raquel Renno Nunes, Senior Digital Programme Officer at Article 19.

6G should not be treated as the inevitable “next step” in mobile evolution until we are clear about what concrete problems it solves, for whom, and at what cost. The 5G experience shows that overstated claims about each new mobile generation, premature spectrum decisions, and vendor-driven narratives can lock policy and investment into paths that deliver far less public value than promised, especially for the Global Majority.

Learning from 5G’s limits before repeating the generational acceleration trap

Despite nearly a decade of deployment and massive investment, the fifth mobile network generation, widely known as 5G, has failed to deliver the commercial and transformational impact that policymakers and industry used to  justify its promotion. Operators invested hundreds of billions in spectrum and network upgrades on the assumption that 5G would unlock new enterprise services, IoT revenues, and premium consumer experiences, yet monetization beyond incremental improvements in consumer mobile broadband has largely stalled. Much of what is now labelled “5G revenue” reflects customers switching to 5G handsets or networks, not from new services that require 5G’s unique capabilities. At the same time, enterprise use cases remain fragmented. Private 5G networks: locally deployed cellular networks designed for individual enterprises or sites rather than public use, were touted as a core 5G revenue opportunity. In practice they have remained largely confined to niche industrial settings. Consumer experiences show little functional differentiation from advanced 4G. The industry’s growing reliance on AI, APIs, and edge computing for 5G is therefore less a sign of 5G maturity than an implicit admission that its original promises—ultra-low latency, new value pools, and transformative applications—have not materialised at scale. As a result, operators face modest returns, consolidation pressures, and ongoing cost reductions. This has left 5G in an identity crisis: a technology that is widely deployed, heavily subsidized through spectrum policy, yet continues to struggle to demonstrate why it was necessary in the first place.

This reassessment matters now because we have entered 2026, just four years before the often-cited horizon for initial 6G deployment, making it critical to avoid repeating the same assumptions in the next generational cycle.

Narratives, incentives, and the problem of premature certainty

The hype around 6G is accelerating rapidly. Governments, vendors, and parts of the research community are already framing it as the inevitable next step in mobile evolution. Yet the underlying narrative remains unsettled and, in many respects, dangerously under-examined. Two recent articles in Light Reading crystallize this tension. One highlights operators’ growing scepticism toward another capital-intensive generational upgrade without a clear revenue case. The other suggests that major vendors such as Ericsson and Nokia are preparing for a future in which the familiar “G-cycle” itself may lose relevance. Taken together, these signals point to a deeper issue: the rush toward 6G risks repeating old mistakes, while ignoring the structural limits of the current mobile paradigm.

The telecommunications industry has a long history of presenting each new mobile generation as a transformative leap—one that will unlock new industries, reshape economic structures, and deliver broad social benefits. In the case of 5G, this pattern appears to have resurfaced in many contexts. Initial expectations focused on rapid transformation and new value creation, yet the industry has delivered mostly  incremental enhancements so far, such as improved spectral efficiency, lower latency in specific scenarios, and additional capacity, rather than a wholesale shift in industry models. This dynamic reflects institutional incentives rather than technical inevitability. Narratives built around successive mobile generations help align vendor roadmaps, justify large spectrum auctions, and sustain the perception that mobile connectivity advances through discrete revolutions. As discussions around 6G gather pace, there are signs that this cycle may repeat. Industry commentary already points to mixed and sometimes contradictory messaging: 6G is framed simultaneously as a software-driven evolution of existing networks and as a justification for reserving large new blocks of spectrum that would require substantial new infrastructure. These inconsistencies reflect the reality that 6G remains at an early research stage, with uncertain use cases, economics, and performance characteristics, yet 6G is increasingly shaping policy conversations.

This matters because such narratives influence regulatory agendas long before technical requirements are settled. Operators are increasingly explicit about their fatigue with expensive hardware refresh cycles that fail to deliver commensurate returns. Despite all of that, spectrum authorities are being asked to consider future allocations and frameworks for 6G despite limited clarity on what problems it is meant to solve, how it would be deployed at scale, or how it compares to existing alternatives. Spectrum, particularly in mid- and high-frequency bands, is a scarce public resource. Prematurely earmarking it for speculative futures risks constraining other valuable uses, including unlicensed and shared access models that have proven effective in supporting technological diversity, innovation and competition.

The risk is compounded when regulatory sequencing is driven by momentum rather than evidence. Once spectrum bands are designated and assumptions embedded in regulation, they are difficult to reverse. The risk is not merely disappointment. It is that policy decisions made today, particularly around spectrum, lock countries into paths that prioritize speculative futures over immediate and demonstrable needs.

Economist Raúl Katz has repeatedly shown that the economic value of spectrum depends less on its designation for the “next generation” of mobile technology than on how flexibly and widely it is made available. Katz demonstrates that unlicensed and shared-use models—such as those supporting Wi-Fi and local access networks—often deliver faster, broader, and more inclusive economic gains than exclusive licensing to mobile incumbents. His analyses highlight that innovation, affordability, and productivity growth frequently arise from diverse and decentralized spectrum use, rather than from locking spectrum into long-term exclusive auctions whose benefits depend on uncertain future deployments. Taken seriously, this evidence reinforces the case for caution in reallocating spectrum pre-emptively for speculative 6G use, particularly when alternative access models can deliver measurable economic and social returns in the near term. Early commitments can lock in long-term allocation patterns before demand, real-world signal behavior, or coexistence challenges are well understood. This narrows future policy options and may delay solutions to existing connectivity gaps.

A more disciplined approach to spectrum policy would resist conflating long-term research visions with near-term regulatory action. It would prioritize demonstrated need, realistic deployment pathways, and proportionality between claimed benefits and regulatory commitments. Technology-neutral and flexible frameworks, including shared and adaptive access models, provide a more resilient foundation than those organized around predefined generational labels.

A sober 6G discourse does not reject research or long-term planning. Rather, it insists on clarity about what is known, what remains speculative, and where uncertainty should counsel restraint. As policy discussions progress, maintaining this distinction will be critical to ensuring that spectrum allocation and regulatory sequencing serve public-interest objectives: supporting connectivity, competition, and innovation, rather than reinforcing hype cycles that have historically delivered far less than promised.

Why the Global Majority should be especially cautious

The dangers of uncritical 6G hype are not evenly distributed. For wealthier markets, a misjudged spectrum auction or over-engineered network may result in stranded assets or delayed returns. For lower-income countries, the stakes are higher. As the Missing Link report shows, benefits achieved in advanced markets do not automatically extend to others.Many regions are still working to achieve meaningful 4G coverage, affordable data prices, and resilient backhaul. For these contexts, the promise of 6G can function as a distraction—drawing attention and investment away from practical interventions that would deliver immediate social and economic gains.

The 6G debate, just like the 5G, is often framed as a race between regions, vendors, or geopolitical blocs. But races encourage shortcuts, and shortcuts in infrastructure policy have long shadows. Progress in connectivity has rarely come from blind acceleration. It has come from careful alignment between technology, economics, and public interest.

Connectivity is framed as a gateway to modernity, competitiveness, and global relevance, provided countries or communities “position themselves early” in the next technological cycle. Structural questions about affordability, governance capacity, relevance to local needs, or alternative development paths are often sidelined in favor of aspirational narratives about catching up, leapfrogging, or not being “left behind.”

The 6G discourse increasingly constructs Global South states as aspirational technological subjects whose legitimacy depends on early adoption of speculative futures. The promise is not redistribution or inclusion, but participation in a competition whose rules are set elsewhere. In this sense, the push to accelerate 6G spectrum allocation and regulatory alignment risks reproducing an older developmental logic: one that substitutes structural transformation with symbolic inclusion in a narrative of progress, while shifting responsibility for success or failure onto those least able to shape the underlying conditions.

There is also a governance dimension. Accelerating toward 6G without clear use cases risks reinforcing vendor-driven agendas in global standardization forums, where the voices of smaller operators, regulators, and civil society are already under-represented. Once spectrum allocations and standards are set, reversing course becomes politically and technically difficult.

Conclusion: slowing down to move forward

A more responsible approach to 6G would begin with humility. Policymakers should demand clearer articulation of problems before embracing solutions. What specific gaps remain after continued 5G evolution, fiber deployment, and Wi-Fi expansion? Which use cases genuinely require new radio technologies, and which could be addressed through better governance, competition policy, or infrastructure sharing?

Spectrum decisions, in particular, should be paced to evidence rather than hype. Pilot allocations, shared-use models, and regional experimentation can provide learning without foreclosing future options. 

Discussions of next-generation networks like 6G often overlook who connectivity serves and how access actually functions as a human rights enabler. In the context of 6G, this critique challenges the assumption that newer, higher-frequency spectrum allocations and vendor-driven network upgrades will automatically translate into equitable, meaningful access. It is important to address that the connectivity ecosystem is becoming more diverse, not more monolithic. This matters because spectrum policy is inherently about trade-offs, not absolutes. Every additional GHz reserved for mobile cellular networks is spectrum not available for other services, such as licence-exempt innovation, satellite systems, fixed links, scientific use, or local and community networks. A credible 6G debate must therefore abandon the assumption that progress equals more exclusive spectrum for International Mobile Telecommunications, and instead confront the complexity of the ecosystem it claims to serve.

Slowing down the 6G conversation is not anti-innovation. It is a necessary step toward ensuring that future networks serve people first, rather than perpetuating a cycle of hype driven by marketing departments, misallocation, and missed opportunity. Without a rights-centred policy framework, 6G deployments risk deepening the very divides they are often rhetorically justified to close.

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