China aims to roll out commercial 6G technology by 2030, with experts noting ongoing technical tests that support the next generation of telecom networks. The country is actively pursuing practical demonstrations and pilot programs to lay the groundwork for widespread 6G use across major markets in North America and beyond.
The two-day 6G 2023 Global Development Conference began in Chongqing, southwestern China, bringing together researchers and leaders to discuss the global path to 6G. Attendees examined performance requirements, key enabling technologies, and practical scenarios where 6G could reshape industries and daily life.
China has positioned itself at the forefront of 6G development. The IMT-2030 (6G) Promotion Group, formed under the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in 2019, serves as a focal point for 6G research, innovation, and international collaboration. The group’s work aims to accelerate progress toward a mature 6G ecosystem that can benefit global users, including those in Canada and the United States.
Wang Zhiqin, chair of the promotion group, outlined China’s 6G plans and potential application scenarios in an interview with China Media Group. He described 6G as the next wave after 5G, noting that mobile communication technologies typically evolve about every decade. He predicted that 6G could begin to scale commercially around 2030, with standardization efforts starting around 2025.
According to Wang, 6G envisions three primary use cases: the fusion of communication and sensing; the convergence of communications with artificial intelligence; and the creation of a ubiquitous Internet of Things. The aim is to connect not only people but also a broad array of intelligent agents, including robots and digital entities. Several industry scenarios that remain challenging for 5G could see meaningful enhancements with 6G. For the general public, the standout advantage is not only higher speeds but the possibility of vastly faster internet and new, transformative services.
As discussions about speed continue, officials suggest 6G will shift toward social management and governance, with intelligent systems playing a central role. While current 5G base stations focus on transmitting and receiving signals, 6G base stations are expected to incorporate more advanced detection capabilities, enabling radio waves to sense surroundings, objects, and movements. This evolution would boost network performance and unlock new opportunities, such as a “low-altitude economy” that enables secure drone use in logistics, travel, and tourism.
Wang explained that the telecom network is a broad system of interlinked base stations. By leveraging this infrastructure, 6G would gain enhanced sensing. This enhancement could support low-altitude aviation management and traffic analytics by upgrading existing base stations and repurposing them for perception tasks, including monitoring drone airspace and providing traffic-flow data at intersections for smarter road management.
At present, 6G worldwide is still in an early research phase, with no unified standards for network architecture or core technologies. China has been conducting 6G technology tests since the previous year and is steadily laying the groundwork for future system designs and technical solutions. The promotion group released two whitepapers during the Chongqing Conference, one detailing prospective 6G network architectures and the other outlining design principles and notable features of 6G wireless systems, guiding a future that moves from the Internet of Everything to an intelligent, connected ecosystem.
During the event, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology stated that ongoing 6G-related testing will continue to push innovative development and speed the integration of 6G with 5G and emerging technologies. The goal is to foster a thriving 6G ecosystem that includes extended reality, digital twins, and robotics, while encouraging close collaboration among technology companies and industries to drive demand, development, and standardization across the full spectrum of 6G initiatives. Officials emphasized joint participation in discovering demand, advancing standards, and shaping a robust 6G application landscape for users in North America and around the world.
6G is expected to reach a broad audience with capabilities surpassing 5G, offering higher capacity, wider coverage, and greater reliability. The International Telecommunication Union, a UN agency, endorsed the 6G vision earlier this year, defining typical products and key metrics for 6G. Among the proposals, five representative 6G application scenarios and a set of 15 core performance indicators have been adopted, signaling a global effort to advance next-generation networks.