MedUX Study Tests UK 5G Mobile Network Performance in London
Network testing and benchmarking firm MedUX has today published new research, which examines the performance and quality of 5G (mobile broadband) networks – including EE (BT), O2 (VMO2), Vodafone and Three UK – across London. The results indicate that EE is leading the pack in most areas, at least in the UK’s capital.
The new analysis is said to be based on a “robust methodology” involving 88,311 radio samples and 11,833 tests conducted in Q3 2023, which evaluated the performance of all four primary Mobile Network Operators (MNO) across various elements essential to 5G service quality and how they cover the UK’s capital. The 5G QoE Benchmarking Report for London then produces an overall QoE score, measuring a combination of availability, accessibility, speed (broadband), streaming, data and OTT (over-the-top) experience results.
Overall, EE provided the highest 5G registration rate (92% of time) and the most consistent experience (99.6% service reliability), leading in areas like accessibility, web navigation, gaming and video streaming. The operator was subject to 22,709 radio samples and 3,040 tests to its network, with findings highlighting “customers will experience an excellent overall quality, fast loading of video content, fast time-to-content in social media and OTT services, commendable gaming experiences, and fast download speeds” (achieving speeds of up to 800Mbps).
Advertisement
In terms of speeds, Vodafone secured the lead in 5G download speed, with an 87% value for speed score, narrowly outperforming EE by around 2%. But Three UK shone in upload performance (UL), achieving a remarkable maximum speed of 157Mbps. Finally, O2 just about managed to come top for having the most reliable DNS resolution service, albeit sharing a 92% DNS score with Three UK.
However, MedUX is also compiling a broader report at a European level (due to be available in the first half of February), which preliminarily shows London as having one of the worst overall experiences when compared to its European counterparts. But for now we only get a very limited overview of take-up.
Advertisement
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, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
« StreetWave Name Three UK Fastest for Mobile Data in Edinburgh
Whilst this study may put London as the worst performing city in preliminary findings it should also be noted that London has a far higher population density and as such this will have an adverse effect on the networks.
Only if the networks haven’t catered for that in their deployments, which you’d generally hope they would – as part of the basic forecasted usage model. Of course every operator will have their own economic choices and practical network considerations, but higher population density is not an insurmountable obstacle – it just depends on what they’re happy to deliver vs cost, and that will vary. Just as it does for every location.
@Danny
There are a fair number of European cities with a greater population density than London, some significantly so (eg Paris, Athens etc). London has a large population but it’s also pretty spread out compared to other cities.
Nope. London has half the population density of the number 2 city, Paris.