Huawei E5788 VS ZTE MF980

With the development of LTE technology, LTE networks are evolving from basic to advanced, or LTE advanced Pro. To support the high-level LTE networks, many manufacturers are presenting their new LTE-A products to accomplishing the data transmission. Huawei, as the top telecom equipment supplier, had recently released the latest new LTE mobile hotspot E5788, the model number is E5788u-96a. The other Chinese competitor ZTE also has its own LTE advanced mobile hotspots named ZTE UFi MF980. You may ask what the difference between Huawei E5788 and ZTE MF980 is. And you want to select one between the two mobile routers, which one is better. In this article, you will find the answers.

Appearance

ZTE MF980 is earlier released than Huawei E5788. But the shape of the two LTE gadgets looks very similar. They are both in cuboids shape, but very thin. The Huawei E5788 has a 2.44-inch color touchscreen, where the user can easily set up the router on the screen. The screen of ZTE MF980 is 1.44 inch TFT screen, and the user can’t do settings on the screen. The Huawei E5788 screen is at the left part of the front while the ZTE MF980 has the screen in the middle.

The USB interface of ZTE MF980 is in Micro USB format while the Huawei E5788 using the USB 2.0 Type-C Interface. The MF980 has two connectors for external antennas while Huawei E5788 has no external antenna connector, which feature is a great disadvantage for the LTE Advanced Pro mobile hotspot. They both use SIM in Micro SIM size.

 

The batteries of both the two LTE mobile routers are non-removable. We think this feature is also not good comparing with another LTE-A pro mobile router Netgear Nighthawk M1, which has large battery capacity and could be removed for changing to spare battery.

As we know, the Huawei E5788 has many colors such as gold, black, blue etc. And the ZTE MF980 also has white, black colors which could be chosen for the customer’s preference. It’s good.

 

Specs

As the LTE advanced mobile hotspots, they both support high wireless download speed. ZTE MF980 supports LTE category 9 which could achieve download speed up to 450Mbps and upload speed to 50mbps while Huawei E5788 could support LTE Cat16 and could achieve download speed to 1Gigabit per second & upload speed more than 100mbps. They are both with WLAN standard on 802.11b/g/n/ac dual band (2.4Ghz & 5Ghz) and support maximum up to 32 wireless users. ZTE MF980 is with 2 x 2 MIMO technology while Huawei E5788 has 4 x 4 MIMO feature.

Below you will see the details for the Huawei E5788 Specs and ZTE MF980 Specs:

 

Model Huawei E5788u-96a ZTE MF980 Ufi
Product type LTE Mobile Hotspot LTE Mobile Hotspot
Category LTE Cat.16 LTE Cat.9
Chipset Qualcomm MDM9250 Qualcomm Cortex-A7 1.2GHz
Data rates DL 1Gbps/UL 100Mbps DL 450Mbps/UL 50Mbps
Supported 4G LTE frequency bands * FDD-LTE: Band 1/2/3/4/5/7/8/19/20/28
* TDD-LTE: Band 38/40/41/42
* FDD-LTE: B1/B3/B5(26)/B7/B8/B20/B28/B32
* TDD-LTE: B40(or B38 or B41)
WiFi 802.11a/b/g/n/ac, dual-band 2.4GHz & 5GHz 802.11a/b/g/n/ac, dual-band 2.4GHz & 5GHz
Max support users 32 users 32 users
MIMO 4 X 4 MIMO 2 x 2 MIMO
Connector for external antenna No connector Two, TS-9 jacks
App management Huawei Hilink APP ZTELINK APP
SIM type Micro SIM Micro SIM
Battery 3000mAh 2200mAh
Dimensions 129 x 65 x 13.5mm  122 * 65 * 10.6mm
Other features 3CC+256QAM
Price 499.00USD 259.00USD

 

From the above, it’s no doubt that Huawei E5788 is more advanced than ZTE MF980 technically. However, the Huawei E5788 doesn’t have the connector for external antenna, which may not be a good news for the users who are located at the areas of weak signal. With the advanced features, Huawei E5788 price is much higher than the ZTE MF980. So if you just need a decent LTE pocket WiFi with high speed, ZTE MF980 is comparably budget one for most users. But we believe the price of Huawei E5788 would be down when 5G devices coming out.

ZTE MF980 4G LTE Category 9 Hotspot Review

The ZTE MF980 Hotspot is a 4G mobile hotspot that offers LTE Category 9 carrier aggregation technology. This 3-band technology achieves a download speed of 450 Mbps and upload speed to 50 Mbps. The supported FDD-LTE frequency bands are:  B1 / B3 / B5 (26) / B7 / B8 / B20 / B28 / B32

For Europe area, the bands in 4G are mainly B3, B7, B20 but also some carriers support the B28(700 MHz). In addition, the ZTE MF980 Mobile Hotspot also support below LTE/UMTS/GSM frequency bands:
* TDD-LTE: B40 (or B38 or B41 gold)
* UMTS: B1 / B2 / B5 / B8
* GSM: 850/900/1800/1900MHz

 

So the ZTE MF980 MiFi 4G could cover fairly wide areas, and it’s good to take as a wireless partner when traveling. We do not have precisely the supported aggregates of bands in 3 CA, we look for the info, but with the bands supported, we remain optimistic for a support in France (B20 + B7 + B3 or B28 + B7 + B20).

Wireless Specifications

The ZTE MF980 4G hotspot also offers Wi-Fi to the 802.11 ac standard operating in simultaneous dual band 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz. Up to 32 simultaneous users can connect for internet access. And it is of course compatible with 802.11b/g/n and offers a 2 × 2 MIMO technology. Equipped with a 2200 mAh battery, it is given for a battery life of 10 hours by the manufacturer.

The 1.44-inch TFT color display allows you to view the usual information, such as operator, signal strength, connection type and level, battery level, number of users connected, and data consumption. The small size of the ZTE MF980 fits easily in the pocket or in a bag.

There are 2 connectors for external antennas in MF980 MiFi. It also has a micro-USB port, a slot for micro-SIM and a cover on the 2 antenna connectors (TS-9 type). If you want to buy the external lte antenna for ZTE MF980, we recommend the tested model: http://www.4gltemall.com/4g-antenna-two-ts-9-connector.html

 

The setup of ZTE MF980 could be done through the web interface, or the Android application (or IOS) ZTELink APP. From the APP, user can do the settings for the mobile 4g router and can see the information about consumed data and battery status clearly.

 

In the market, ZTE MF980 is the first LTE cat.9 mobile hotspot. And we know another model Netgear Aircard 800s which also support LTE category 9. We would take further test between the two LTE cat9 mobile hotspots.

 

Below are the highlights of ZTE MF980 Technical specifications:

* Sleek Design
* 1.44 TFT Display
* Support 3CA High Speed
* Support FDD-LTE network: B1 / B3 / B5 (26) / B7 / B8 / B20 / B28 / B32
* Support TDD-LTE network: B40 (or B38 or B41 gold)
* UMTS: B1 / B5 / B8 / B2
* GSM: 850/900/1800/1900MHz
* Wi-Fi b/g/n/ac
* Wi-Fi 2 × 2 MIMO
* 2.4GHz & 5GHz
* Support 32 devices at the same time
* LTE-FDD Data Rate: DL 450Mbps/ UL 50Mbps (Category9)
* LTE-TDD: DL 330Mbps / UL 11 Mbps
* Dimensions: 122 * 65 * 10.6mm
* Battery: 2200mAh
* Other features
– 1 x Micro USB port
– 1 x Func Button,
– 1 x Power Switch,
– 1 x Reset Hole; SIM socket, Micro USIM
– 2 x External Antenna slot (TS-9 connector)