United Arab Emirates has a Fantastic 5G Experience but Coverage Needs to Improve

The UAE has a strong mobile market, dominated by Etisalat and du. Both are majority-owned by the government. In a bid to attract additional foreign investment, it was resolved in early 2021 that the stake held by foreigners in the two companies could be increased.

The U.A.E. was the fastest 5G market globally in Q2 2023 according to Ookla's Speedtest Intelligence data, with growing competition between the nation’s two network operators helping to drive overall performance in the market to reach a median download speed of 557.63 Mbps. etisalat by e& was the fastest 5G operator globally with a median download speed of 680.73 Mbps.

Etisalat and du have deployed LTE networks providing national coverage, while the 5G penetration rate is the second highest globally after China. This has underpinned growth in the mobile broadband sector, and has enabled the strong development in the take-up of rich content and applications, as well as m-commerce. To help increase the capacity of 5G networks in coming years, and so keep up with data demand, the government has allowed for the GSM networks to be closed down and for spectrum and other assets to be re-purposed for 5G by the end of 2022.

According to the most recent Open Signal report  Etisalat remains top for award hauls. The operator takes home the greatest number of award wins, with nine outright victories and one shared win, a change from the last report when it was the sole victor in seven categories and shared first place with du in a further four. Du manages a respectable six first place finishes, five outright wins and its shared win with Etisalat for 5G Voice App Experience.

There has been a lot of focus on 5G in the United Arab Emirates, with both operators announcing partnerships with equipment vendors in February 2023. Du has partnered with Huawei to develop 5.5G (or 5G-Advanced) technology. They are expecting it to offer greatly improved data speeds, lower latency and increased energy efficiency. Not to be outdone, Etisalat has chosen Nokia to upgrade its existing 5G network, with the vendor providing services for replacing existing equipment and implementing automated transport slicing. Along with this, in late February 2023 Etisalat launched its commercial 5G standalone access (SA) network. The operator expects that the SA network will offer enhanced performance for business and residential customers

Both Emirati national operators have turned their attention to satellite connectivity, with du demonstrating what it claims to be the first satellite-enabled 5G backhaul in the Middle East, using SES's satellites in January 2023. Since then, Etisalat announced that it has launched a 5G satellite solution, partnered with Eutelsat. Using satellite technology would bring access to remote areas with low terrestrial connectivity, and it will be interesting to see how these technologies develop.

The Telecommunications and Digital Government Regulatory Authority (TDRA) in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has announced the completion of the second phase of testing of 5G-Advanced services in the 6GHz band. The regulator is working with local service providers Etisalat and Du on the trial, with the aim of achieving 10Gbps download speeds using 400MHz of spectrum in the 6GHz range. The TDRA’s director general, Majed Sultan al-Mesmar, commented: 

‘The exponential number of internet users, and the scientific advances witnessed by the world today, require new speeds to accommodate the increasing load on networks and keep up with the high specifications of emerging technologies on the world stage such as metaverse applications, to name a few. Having attained a speed of 10Gbps … this new, globally unprecedented speed will lead to faster data transfer, ushering in a new era of high-quality streaming and seamless cloud services. The trial will also enhance the IoT by providing the infrastructure necessary to simultaneously handle multiple connected devices, while ensuring seamless and reliable connectivity.’

Meanwhile in May 2023 Du completed a successful demonstration of 5G Voice over New Radio (VoNR) technology to showcase its 5G Standalone (SA) capabilities. The trial was carried out in conjunction with equipment partners Huawei and Nokia.

Saleem AlBlooshi, Chief Technology Officer at Du, said: 

‘The successful demonstration of 5G network VoNR capabilities represents a significant milestone at a time when the digital sector is entering a new era. It enables unprecedented simultaneous voice and data transmissions and provides incredibly rapid connectivity transmission rates.’

Du claimed eight million mobile subscriptions and 559,000 fixed broadband subscriptions at the end of June 2023, up 8.0% and 18.3% year-on-year, respectively.

While 5G speeds, rollout and adoption increasing rapidly, according to OpenSignal, 5G availability is still low for both the operators and has a lot of scope for improvements. With the rapid rate of deployment, this number is surely bound to go up in the coming years.

Related Posts:

• Operator Watch Blog: 4G Connectivity in UAE becoming Ubiquitous
• Operator Watch Blog: Three Middle East Operators launch 'World's First' 5G Networks 

4G Connectivity in UAE becoming Ubiquitous

Mobile services in the UAE are primarily provided by two mobile operators: Etisalat and du. The country remains is a duopoly with two state-protected providers. Both of them are partly state-owned. Etisalat is the oldest and leading mobile service provider in the region with over half of the total mobile phone service market. Du launched just over a decade ago and has seen phenomenal growth thanks to their flexible plans and by-the-second billing system.

Picture based on Hootsuite / We are Social

2G is on 900 and 1800 MHz, 3G on 2100 MHz up to DC-HSPA+. 4G/LTE is on 1800 MHz (B3) and 800 MHz (B20). The coverage of both operators is very good in the cities, populated areas and along the desert highways on 2G, 3G and even 4G/LTE, giving good speed and performance.

Etisalat is the biggest telco operator with 13 million customers and the best mobile 3G and 4G coverage in the UAE. It's partly state owned and more focused on the internal market. Their prepaid SIM called Wasel is open for 4G/LTE, already covering 90% of population. Etisalat quickly opened up stores in tourist areas and now competes with du for prepaid plans.

Etisalat was the first operator in the Middle East and North Africa region to commercially launch 5G service and the device in the UAE. The operator has tied up with Chinese smartphone manufacturer ZTE to offer the service. Subscribers using the ZTE Axon 10 Pro, the first available 5G device from Etisalat, can now enjoy the blazing speed of the 5G network up to 1Gbps and lower latency around 1 millisecond. However the 5G network will be available for all Etisalat postpaid, prepaid, consumer and business customers using a 5G devices. All customers will be able to use existing data packs on the 5G network.



Du is the second largest mobile network operator in the UAE and 39.5% state owned. They now care for about 9 million users and are preferred by most expats, migrant workers and visitors. Du has also rolled out its 5G network in collaboration with ZTE.



In Open Signal's latest report on the UAE mobile market, Etisalat’s dominance continues to prevail in mobile network experience. It won six out of our eight award categories and also established a new benchmark in Download Speed Experience with speeds averaging above 40 Mbps. In this report its was also observed that users in the UAE are finding it increasingly easier to get a 4G connection as both operators have now passed the 90% 4G Availability mark.

As 4G connectivity becomes more ubiquitous, the country is turning its attention to 5G. In November last year both the operators — Etisalat and du — were allocated frequencies in the 3.3GHz-3.8GHz spectrum range with 100 MHz blocks each to establish their 5G networks, and both operators launched their 5G services in the middle of 2019. Besides the frequencies mentioned above, the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) is also looking to assign further spectrum in the 24.25GHz-27.5GHz bands for 5G use ahead of the Dubai 2020 Expo, while it could also assign spectrum above 40GHz after 2020.

Etisalat held onto the 4G Availability award, increasing its score by 3.6 percentage points to reach 93.1% in the past six months . But du also saw its score jump by 3.3 percentage points, as both operators passed the 90% national 4G Availability milestone. Etisalat also won our inaugural 4G Coverage Experience in the country with a score of 9.6 (on a 10-point scale), while du was slightly lower with a score of 9.2 points.


Related posts:

• Operator Watch Blog:  Etisalat: Striving for 5G
• Operator Watch Blog: Three Middle East Operators launch 'World's First' 5G Networks