Qualcomm modem license is relatively expensive for a laptop. I suspect that, once Apple is ready to launch their own modem, they will include that in their laptops, too.
It disconnects whenever the laptop enters sleep mode, it causes the phone to run very hot and consume lots of battery and, yes, it requires manual intervention before it can be used.
I agree that overall these are probably small issues, but built-in mobile network access would have usability benefits
With a MacBook internal modem would you then have to purchase another 5G plan and a sim or pay extra for including that in your phone plan? I would imagine it’s not cheap
In my country there are plans that allow for multiple additional devices to be linked to an account.
I wouldn’t have to pay anything extra for a 5G MacBook.
Which of course makes total sense technically. Because for my mobile operator there’s no difference (bandwidth wise. And given the packet switched nature of LTE and later, that’s all that matters) whether I’m tethering or connecting multiple devices.
On Android tethering can be enabled with just a few taps.
I wonder whether this could be automated, e.g. you click on the macOS toolbar and a macOS app communicates with an Android app and the apps do the needed actions in the respective operating systems (enable tethering on Android, connect to the WiFi network from macOS).
On the other hand, from a user's perspective only one SIM card and data allotment is needed. I much prefer two devices that I would own anyway over two SIM cards with (in most cases) separate monthly subscriptions or data packs.
People won't stop buying phones because their laptops are 5G enabled. The laptop's eSIM would be on the same plan as the phone. It would help carriers to push more expensive plans with much bigger data caps, which is easy with 5G. To the point of eating some home broadband market share- I imagine some people canceling their home broadband like they've cancelled their phone landlines, which initially seemed unthinkable.