Vodacom tests a smaller 4G/5G antenna stack for crowded South African tower sites

Vodacom South Africa has tested a compact radio-antenna configuration with Nokia in the Western Cape that is designed to add 4G and 5G capacity at sites where space, weight or structural limits make conventional upgrades difficult.

The trial combines passive antenna functions with active Massive MIMO hardware in a tighter installation. Reporting on the test says the configuration supports dual-band Massive MIMO across 2600MHz and 3500MHz spectrum, giving Vodacom another way to use existing sites and spectrum in high-demand areas.

For customers, the useful question is not whether the antenna is physically smaller. It is whether operators can add capacity faster in places where towers, rooftops and municipal structures are already crowded with radio equipment.

Why tower space has become a network problem

Mobile networks add capacity through a mix of spectrum, denser sites and more capable radios. Massive MIMO is particularly useful on mid-band 5G spectrum because arrays of antenna elements can direct capacity more efficiently towards users.

The hardware is also physically demanding. Adding separate active and passive antennas can run into limits around wind loading, tower space, cabling and lease arrangements. An integrated configuration is meant to reduce some of that deployment friction.

Nokia and Vodacom already have a wider radio-access-network relationship. In 2025 Nokia said its extended Vodafone and Vodacom agreement included AirScale equipment and Africa’s first deployment of its dual-band 5G Massive MIMO radio. The Western Cape test pushes that approach towards a more compact site configuration.

The South African spectrum angle

The trial uses 2600MHz and 3500MHz bands, both important to South Africa’s post-auction mobile broadband build-out. Operators paid for access to additional high-demand spectrum because more spectrum can translate into higher capacity, but the radio layer still has to be deployed where customers actually create congestion.

That is where compact equipment becomes commercially relevant. A radio that fits an existing constrained site may be cheaper and quicker to deploy than strengthening a structure, finding a new rooftop or building another tower.

It does not eliminate the other bottlenecks. Backhaul capacity, power resilience, site permissions and the density of the network still determine the customer experience.

What remains unresolved

Vodacom has described the Western Cape deployment as a successful test, not a nationwide rollout. There is no published South African deployment schedule, site count or customer-speed dataset attached to the announcement.

Until those numbers arrive, the result is best read as a network-engineering option rather than a promise of an immediate 5G speed increase. The practical signal will be whether Vodacom starts using the integrated configuration at scale in constrained urban sites.