For the first time in PCMag’s 12 years of testing mobile networks in the United States, T-Mobile has been named the fastest mobile network . With average download speeds of 162.3Mbps, T-Mobile greatly outperformed the competition in most cities. After years of lagging behind, how did T-Mobile turn it around?
Investing in C-band
In the race to provide 5G service , the major carriers pursued different strategies. Verizon and AT&T expanded their use of mmWave , a band of spectrum that provides high speeds but doesn’t travel far. Indoor places with heavy traffic like airports are perfect for mmWave , but it’s unsuitable for outdoor broadband, especially in less-populated areas like the rural stretches between cities.
What did T-Mobile do differently? It bought Sprint. The acquisition gave T-Mobile access to a cache of midband airwaves, increasing their capacity to offer 5G service. T-Mobile was the only carrier with nationwide 5G that was considerably faster than 4G. In cities like Chicago, Las Vegas, New York, and Tucson, Arizona, T-Mobile 5G phones made use of 5G around 90% of the time.
What about the competition?
Verizon and AT&T showed a decline in overall speed, but that’s probably about to change. Those two companies spent almost $70 billion on C-band licenses at a Federal Communications Commission (FCC) auction in February 2021. They’ll begin deploying 5G on that spectrum starting in December.
T-Mobile’s 5G service was the fastest overall, but its coverage is lacking in small cities and rural regions. AT&T outperformed T-Mobile in those regions, particularly in the Northwest and the Carolinas. AT&T’s average download speed was 98.2Mbps, much slower than T-Mobile’s, but that doesn’t make a difference if T-Mobile doesn’t provide coverage in your area.
At 93.7Mbps, Verizon’s average download speed was slightly lower than AT&T’s. The company bought more C-band licenses than any other, so it’s poised to offer faster speeds in the near future as it rolls out 5G service.
If you haven’t already upgraded to a 5G phone , it’s going to be worth doing soon regardless of which carrier you use. The difference between 4G and 5G has been underwhelming, but T-Mobile’s win proves that midband 5G is going to change that.
