(Yicai Global) May 19 -- China Mobile, one of the country’s major phone carriers, has released a virtual phone service to free users of the physical restrictions of their handsets while offering calls based on fifth-generation wireless networks.

Users of the so-called cloud phone can control it via China Mobile's website or mobile application on a physical handset and choose device features such as storage or processor capacity, Yicai Global learned as the Beijing-based firm released the product on the annual World Telecommunication Day, May 17.

Even clients of other network providers can sign up for a trial with two hours of free use every day. The service supports high-definition videos. In the future, clients can create their own data plans based on computing power demand, choosing the capacity of central processing and graphic processing units, cache, and storage, China Mobile said.

Moreover, China Mobile and American chipmaker Qualcomm announced that they have teamed up with Chinese handset makers such as Vivo Communication Technology, Xiaomi, and ZTE to test a service of 5G-based phone calls based on IMS data channels that enable more interactive calls with features such as screen-sharing, emojis, or augmented reality overlays.

As 5G networks are deployed at a large scale, 5G phone calls relying on IMS architecture will be continuously making progress, said Sun Gang, Vice President of Product Marketing at Qualcomm.

Editors: Shi Yi, Emmi Laine, Xiao Yi