Sponsored Links

USB vs WiFi – Tethering

Lucian

ULTIMATE Member
Just read @Mark.J article https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.p...broadband-to-a-laptop-via-android-phones.html and thought there's a better way to measure this.

I went ahead and tested between my Pixel 3a phone and my laptop with iperf3. Results below, but tldr:
===
USB2 tethering speed and latency: 230 Mbps, 1.17ms
WIFI tethering: 30 Mbps, 25.5ms
===

So there you go, absolutely massive difference. I reckon speeds would have been even better had my phone had USB3 capability, alas it's not the case.

At this point, if you have a 5G capable phone and the USB port is not version 3... you're missing out as it's unlikely you'll be able to saturate your uplink given good radio connection and backhaul.

More info..

USB2 Tethering:

~]$ iperf3 -c 192.168.42.129
Connecting to host 192.168.42.129, port 5201
[ 5] local 192.168.42.77 port 37176 connected to 192.168.42.129 port 5201
[ ID] Interval Transfer Bitrate Retr Cwnd
[ 5] 0.00-1.00 sec 27.5 MBytes 231 Mbits/sec 0 211 KBytes
[ 5] 1.00-2.00 sec 27.8 MBytes 233 Mbits/sec 0 250 KBytes
[ 5] 2.00-3.00 sec 27.8 MBytes 233 Mbits/sec 0 378 KBytes
[ 5] 3.00-4.00 sec 27.4 MBytes 230 Mbits/sec 0 420 KBytes
[ 5] 4.00-5.00 sec 27.4 MBytes 230 Mbits/sec 0 447 KBytes
[ 5] 5.00-6.00 sec 27.3 MBytes 229 Mbits/sec 0 495 KBytes
[ 5] 6.00-7.00 sec 27.4 MBytes 230 Mbits/sec 0 522 KBytes
[ 5] 7.00-8.00 sec 27.5 MBytes 230 Mbits/sec 0 522 KBytes
[ 5] 8.00-9.00 sec 27.5 MBytes 231 Mbits/sec 0 522 KBytes
[ 5] 9.00-10.00 sec 27.5 MBytes 230 Mbits/sec 0 522 KBytes
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[ ID] Interval Transfer Bitrate Retr
[ 5] 0.00-10.00 sec 275 MBytes 231 Mbits/sec 0 sender
[ 5] 0.00-10.00 sec 273 MBytes 229 Mbits/sec receiver

iperf Done.

(ping -c100 -i0.1)
--- 192.168.42.129 ping statistics ---
100 packets transmitted, 100 received, 0% packet loss, time 9958ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 0.869/1.179/2.432/0.169 ms


WIFI:


~]$ iperf3 -c 192.168.43.47
Connecting to host 192.168.43.47, port 5201
[ 5] local 192.168.43.238 port 36144 connected to 192.168.43.47 port 5201
[ ID] Interval Transfer Bitrate Retr Cwnd
[ 5] 0.00-1.00 sec 4.83 MBytes 40.5 Mbits/sec 0 253 KBytes
[ 5] 1.00-2.00 sec 3.11 MBytes 26.1 Mbits/sec 0 376 KBytes
[ 5] 2.00-3.00 sec 3.91 MBytes 32.8 Mbits/sec 0 404 KBytes
[ 5] 3.00-4.00 sec 3.60 MBytes 30.2 Mbits/sec 0 510 KBytes
[ 5] 4.00-5.00 sec 5.72 MBytes 48.0 Mbits/sec 0 652 KBytes
[ 5] 5.00-6.00 sec 3.75 MBytes 31.5 Mbits/sec 0 700 KBytes
[ 5] 6.00-7.00 sec 2.50 MBytes 21.0 Mbits/sec 0 744 KBytes
[ 5] 7.00-8.00 sec 2.50 MBytes 21.0 Mbits/sec 0 776 KBytes
[ 5] 8.00-9.00 sec 5.00 MBytes 42.0 Mbits/sec 0 912 KBytes
[ 5] 9.00-10.00 sec 2.50 MBytes 21.0 Mbits/sec 8 638 KBytes
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[ ID] Interval Transfer Bitrate Retr
[ 5] 0.00-10.00 sec 37.4 MBytes 31.4 Mbits/sec 8 sender
[ 5] 0.00-10.00 sec 34.5 MBytes 29.0 Mbits/sec receiver

iperf Done.

--- 192.168.43.47 ping statistics ---
100 packets transmitted, 100 received, 0% packet loss, time 10018ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 1.808/25.578/115.440/42.240 ms, pipe 2

PS: Because my laptop's wifi chipset is quite old I went ahead and used my wife's Huawei P30 as another iperf3 client, wifi speed test results were considerably better: 67 Mbps. Still no match for the USB cable though.
 
Thought I'd give this a shot on my iPhone 11 Pro Max

Over WiFi:
1617991637995.webp


With a USB cable:
1617991622190.webp
 
and of course on the device itself:
1617991790290.webp


USB Cable seems to be the real winner here. My WiFi chipset is very good but the USB cable has much better performance. That being said, the WiFi connection isn't bad at all and would certainly be usable.
 
Sponsored Links
lucian
If you do a properties of the wi fi device you will see where its restricted.
My device shows Link speed 72Mbits/2.4Ghz and Speedtests at about 60Mbps.
 

Attachments

  • spec.webp
    spec.webp
    24.7 KB · Views: 130
On Usb 3 to Usb type c cable (10Gbit) It runs at whatever i can pick up on my phone.. Did a speed test of 227Mbps..Web pages loaded so fast they almost had your eye out.
Even 60Mbps is fast enough to do anything...on WI-Fi.
 
Run an iperf3 benchmark, not internet speedtests, see what you get.
 
Remember to do these tests a few hundred times and at different times of day. Also keep an eye on the servers being auto-selected by the tester as you need stability. I found that a lot of "differences" in the results evaporated with more testing and the averages ender up closer, but of course the big problem here is that the local mobile broadband performance didn't allow me to really push to the limits on either WiFi or USB.
 
Sponsored Links
@Mark.J that's why I did not bother to do internet speedtests at all.

The tests were done purely between the phone and the tethered devices using iperf3, wanted to see "raw" usb vs wifi speeds.
 
Top
Cheap BIG ISPs for 100Mbps+
Community Fibre UK ISP Logo
150Mbps
Gift: None
Virgin Media UK ISP Logo
Virgin Media £22.99
132Mbps
Gift: None
Vodafone UK ISP Logo
Vodafone £24.00 - 26.00
150Mbps
Gift: None
NOW UK ISP Logo
NOW £24.00
100Mbps
Gift: None
Plusnet UK ISP Logo
Plusnet £25.99
145Mbps
Gift: £50 Reward Card
Large Availability | View All
Cheapest ISPs for 100Mbps+
Gigaclear UK ISP Logo
Gigaclear £17.00
200Mbps
Gift: None
Community Fibre UK ISP Logo
150Mbps
Gift: None
Virgin Media UK ISP Logo
Virgin Media £22.99
132Mbps
Gift: None
Hey! Broadband UK ISP Logo
150Mbps
Gift: None
Youfibre UK ISP Logo
Youfibre £23.99
150Mbps
Gift: None
Large Availability | View All
Sponsored Links
The Top 15 Category Tags
  1. FTTP (6024)
  2. BT (3639)
  3. Politics (2720)
  4. Business (2439)
  5. Openreach (2405)
  6. Building Digital UK (2330)
  7. Mobile Broadband (2144)
  8. FTTC (2083)
  9. Statistics (1899)
  10. 4G (1814)
  11. Virgin Media (1763)
  12. Ofcom Regulation (1582)
  13. Fibre Optic (1467)
  14. Wireless Internet (1462)
  15. 5G (1405)
Sponsored

Copyright © 1999 to Present - ISPreview.co.uk - All Rights Reserved - Terms  ,  Privacy and Cookie Policy  ,  Links  ,  Website Rules