Vodafone UK Named Best Mobile Network in Central London
A new study from SignalTracker, which operates a popular Android-based mobile app for monitoring and examining mobile phone reception and performance (not available on Apple’s iOS), has named Vodafone as the best mobile operator in Central London for its balance of 4G / 5G coverage and mobile broadband speeds.
The figures quoted below stem from over 11,000 tests carried out by PolicyTracker in February and March 2025. Each network was tested outdoors simultaneously at the same locations. The research is based on real-world user experience using data from the SignalTracker app, developed by PolicyTracker.
Interestingly, the study found that Three UK had the “fastest network” in the area, with an average mobile broadband download speed of 49.79Mbps. But the operator struggled in the overall ranking for Central London because it was found to have “very patchy coverage with too many dead zones“.
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By comparison, in terms of raw speed, Vodafone’s average network speed is just behind at 47.57Mbps, with EE (BT) and O2 (Virgin Media) the slowest at 34.53Mbps and 32.27Mbps respectively. A further factor for people to consider is if their Smartphone is actually getting 5G.
The 5G icons don’t necessarily mean that the phone has an active 5G connection, confusingly, it can sometimes mean that 5G equipment is available on the base station the phone is connected to and the actual signal is still 4G (somewhat of a quirk with how modern Smartphones work).
On this front, Vodafone also performed the best: 89% of their test results were actual 5G connections. Three UK was second with 59%, while both EE (7%) and O2 (13%) were far behind. Interestingly, it was noted that some 87% of test results on EE were 4G with a 5G icon showing (all the other operators were in single digit percentage points for this).
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.
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I have O2 as my mobile provider and I live in central London, my speeds from them is never ever slow, it is always about 80 to 183 speeds. I’m not sure why that was not registered with the tests that were done here.
No surprise there. O2 is fubar and EE’s C-band is not much better than mmWave, penetration-wise.
Until they capitalize on 700 MHz things are unlikely to change.
Vodafone the best are you sure I suppose if your near a mast it’s fine yes outside
This is great news for Vodaphone in Central London. People live in other places in the UK and Vodaphone need to concentrate on providing a signal in the Regions. 5G in the North East for example,
I think test on EE were done without priority on the network because I have fast 5G everywhere in central London .