On the Eve of a RMB 5 Trillion Blue Ocean: Who Is Building the "5G Expressway" for China’s Skies in 2026?

The spring of 2026 has brought more than greenery to the elevated roads of China’s cities—it has also turned unprecedented attention toward the skies above them. Looking down over China today, one can observe an entirely new landscape taking shape: in Shenzhen, food-delivery drones move between high-rise buildings; along the Nanjing section of the Yangtze River, waterborne logistics routes operate around the clock; and on the cross-sea corridor between Shenzhen and Zhuhai, eVTOLs (electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft) are reducing what was once a three-hour drive to a 20-minute flight.

This is no longer the domain of science fiction. It reflects a genuine “dimensional upgrade” in China’s transportation system. From the vantage point of 2026, the low-altitude economy is no longer simply about “more aircraft in the sky,” but rather a profound restructuring of space, efficiency, and technology.

The “Dimensional Upgrade” of Infrastructure:From Building Roads to Weaving Networks

Traditional transportation has been fundamentally two-dimensional: roads are paved on the ground, bridges are built across rivers, and railways are laid along fixed corridors. The rise of the low-altitude economy, however, represents a shift from a planar transportation network to a three-dimensional airspace system. Based on multiple reports in Insight Research’s internal database, the core of this transformation lies in a redefinition of infrastructure itself. Low-altitude transport no longer depends solely on physical construction, but instead on a digitally driven, network-based system of “virtual air routes.”

In effect, this is akin to building an invisible network in the sky. To support this network, China is advancing a new generation of integrated air-ground infrastructure at the national level. The China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT) has proposed a “four-domain” architecture, within which the new infrastructure domain is particularly critical. This includes not only visible facilities such as take-off and landing sites, but also the invisible backbone of a low-altitude intelligent connectivity network, encompassing communications, sensing, and navigation systems.

(Source: China Academy of Information and Communications Technology)

The decisive factor in this dimensional transformation lies in whether soft infrastructure can keep pace. Low-altitude communications are evolving from traditional direct remote control toward a more connected model based on 5G/5G-A cellular networks. At present, the industry has already explored multiple technical approaches, including “wide-angle air-ground integrated coverage” and “fish-scale networking,” in an effort to address challenges such as discontinuous low-altitude coverage and high levels of interference. This competition to establish the foundational communications layer will determine whether the future trillion-yuan flow of low-altitude traffic can move safely and efficiently through the air.

(Source: IMT-2030 (6G) Promotion Group)

The Breakthrough in Transport Efficiency:Heavy-Lift Expansion and Logistics Restructuring

If infrastructure forms the skeleton, then application scenarios provide the flesh and blood. As of 2026, the low-altitude economy is undergoing a qualitative shift—from being viewed as a “novelty” to becoming a true transport solution.

In the logistics sector, this transition is visible in the move from isolated test flights to fully networked three-dimensional operations. According to the report, low-altitude logistics has already entered a stage of broad expansion, particularly in urban routes (which account for 90% of the total) and in geographically challenging areas such as mountainous regions and islands. Meituan’s nighttime drone deliveries in Shenzhen and SF Express’s water-based logistics operations along the Yangtze River both demonstrate the efficiency advantages of low-altitude logistics in the “last mile” and even the “last nautical mile.”

(Source: Dagong Global Credit Rating)

However, the true highlight lies in the heavy-lift logistics segment, particularly in the niche track of tandem-rotor unmanned helicopters. These “aerial trucks,” designed with a front-and-rear dual-rotor tandem configuration, are emerging as a strong complement to trunk-route logistics due to their advantages in heavy payload capacity (with some models exceeding the one-ton threshold), long endurance, and strong wind resistance and stability. The report forecasts that the market size of this segment will surge from RMB 126 million in 2025 to RMB 2.337 billion in 2029, representing an extraordinary compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 107.34%.

This indicates that low-altitude logistics in the future will go far beyond parcel delivery—it will also be capable of transporting heavy materials and even participating in the deployment of nationally significant strategic supplies.

(Source: LeadLeo Research Institute)

As for passenger transportation, although eVTOLs have attracted significant attention, they are still in the pilot stage characterized by “tourism first, commuting later.” According to forecasts from the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT), only by 2030, during the regional commercial phase, will sightseeing tourism and intercity commuting be likely to become truly normalized, as technology matures and costs decline.

The Contest for Scalable Growth:The Path Toward a RMB 5 Trillion Blue Ocean

When we discuss the future of the low-altitude economy, we are in fact discussing how a vast industrial cluster can evolve from disorder into an organized system.

The development of the low-altitude industry is expected to follow a strict three-step strategy: localized pilot programs (by 2027), regional commercialization (by 2030), and large-scale development (by 2035). By 2035, the market size of the low-altitude industry is projected to reach an astonishing RMB 5 trillion.

During this process, however, the industry still faces a structural contradiction: strong policy-driven momentum but relatively weak market-driven momentum. Most enterprises have yet to establish sustainable commercial closed loops, while fragmented regulatory standards—often described as “one province, one policy”—continue to create barriers to nationwide scale.