To meet massive wireless traffic demand in the future fifth generation (5G) cellular networks, small-cell networks are emerging as an attractive solution for 5G network deployments. The cellular coverage characteristic is a key issue for the deployment of the small-cell networks. Considering the anisotropic path loss in wireless channels of real cellular scenarios, in this paper the fractal coverage characteristic is first used to evaluate the performance of the small-cell networks. Moreover, the coverage probability, average achievable rate, and the area spectral efficiency are derived for fractal small-cell networks. Compared with the average achievable rate and area spectral efficiency with isotropic path loss models, the average achievable rate and area spectral efficiency with anisotropic path loss models have been underestimated in the fractal small-cell networks. Considering the impact of the anisotropic path loss on wireless channels, most of performances of wireless cellular networks need to be re-evaluated. This paper provides a tractable method to investigate the performance of the small-cell networks with fractal coverage characteristics.