O2 Reveals Top UK Cities with Highest Mobile Data Consumption
Mobile operator O2 (Telefonica) has revealed a list of the top 10 most data hungry (mobile broadband) UK cities for September 2020, which sees Bradford top the list after it saw data consumption on their network jump by 50% when compared with the same time last year. Meanwhile Coventry came a close second (47%).
The figures may partly reflect the fact that Bradford is about to enter its third month of local COVID-19 restrictions. Since the start of lockdown O2 has upgraded 4G capacity in over 8,800 postcodes across some of these cities, including 1,600 in Bradford, 1,300 in Sheffield and 1,200 in Hull.
As people increasingly rely on technology to keep them connected with loved ones, O2 found that data traffic spikes since lockdown have often coincided with key moments for the country, including the end of the Premier League season, the Champions League final and the Government’s lockdown announcement at the end of April 2020.
Top UK Cities for Rises in Data Consumption (vs 2019)
Bradford: +50%
Coventry: +47%
Hull: +42%
Norwich: +42%
Nottingham: +42%
Derby: +41%
Leicester: +40%
Sheffield: +36%
Aberdeen: +35%
Bournemouth: +34%
Brendan O’Reilly, O2’s Chief Technology Officer, said: “Mobile connectivity has become a true lifeline for many and will continue to play a vital role in keeping Britain connected. We remain committed to doing everything we can to help our customers stay in contact with their colleagues, friends and loved ones during this challenging period.”
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook and Linkedin.
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Hate O2’s network. Why pay a premium price tag that is similar to EE’s and receive a network speed slower than Three’s?
Simple can get o2 signal indoors no EE coverage unless stood outside it depends which service is available in your area from personal experience I’ve found EE faster when you can get it but o2 gives far better coverage and is therefore more reliable
That’s the reason I changed from EE to O2. The coverage is better where I need it and therefore O2 is faster than EE.
100% agree David. I did exactly the same.
Yes I would say whilst EE may have faster speeds their network does often have no or very limited coverage where as 02 are slower but much more reliable in that you get a signal in far more places This was the main reason I swapped from BT mobile (EE) to Sky (02) as I would much rather have blanket coverage that 02 offer here in SW.
Depends which package you were on, the non-Smart packages lack Band 20 access and volte.
Totally dependant on area favourites I guess….
Networks have different reputations in different areas. its as simple as that.
Birmingham I would say has always been a city where Orange (then EE) had a good reputation, from my point of view this was due to Orange securing good and high locations for their masts and then when EE came in and T-Mobile sites also got put into the mix they had a good selection of sites to choose from and bringing onboard 800mhz helps with coverage further too.
However O2 here in brum is somewhat poor setups, low or bad locations for masts which wasn’t really an issue in the 3G days due to use of 900mhz but now is a huge issue with higher frequencies on 4G, the mast sharing deal with Vodafone has helped a little bit, but O2 and Vodafone already seemed to occupy same mast location areas anyway presumably again because of 900mhz on 3g.
Three coverage improved when they started getting access to EE sites through MBNL however they lack spectrum and have capacity issues with back haul.
However I have been to different areas where Vodafone has been the obvious leader and again have the best range of mast locations and that leads to using better and higher frequency bands which then balances load across the network well.
Becarefull been ripped off by 02 loads of time even when I cancelled it over a year ago