In the latest market analysis report from network analytics firm Ookla, T-Mobile maintained its general position as the fastest mobile data provider in the United States, with a median download speed of 116Mbps, beating Verizon and AT&T by about twice. Additionally, the report based on Q3 testing found that Spectrum topped the ranking of fastest fixed broadband services, beating out Cox and Xfinity for the top spot with a median download speed of 211Mbps.
The data was collected through Ookla’s online Speedtest website, which lets users test their internet connection’s upload speeds, download speeds, latency, and more.
How mobile network speeds compare
Multi-server latency — a measure of the latency a user might experience when the network is not under particularly high load conditions — topped the mobile broadband category with a median of 59 milliseconds, compared with 60 milliseconds for T-Mobile and 60 milliseconds for T-Mobile. Mobile is 61 ms AT&T. There was also fierce competition for the most consistent throughput performance among the three major carriers, with 84.4% of tests on T-Mobile’s network reporting download speeds of at least 5Mbps, compared with Verizon and AT&T respectively. are 79.6% and 79.4%.
However, the report found that T-Mobile is far ahead in 5G performance. The carrier’s median 5G download speed was 193Mbps, well above second-place Verizon’s 119Mbps and more than double AT&T’s 81Mbps figure. T-Mobile also leads in Ookla’s 5G availability metric, which captures the share of 5G-enabled users on the network who are connected to the company’s 5G network most of the time. T-Mobile’s 69% availability figure beats AT&T’s 59%, and significantly beats Verizon’s 32%.
Fixed broadband has no clear speed winner
There is no clear strongest performer among fixed broadband providers, as various networks perform well ahead across different metrics. According to Ookla’s report, the fastest average upload speed was posted by AT&T at 125Mbps, ahead of Verizon’s 108Mbps, with the rest of the region at 30Mbps or lower. Verizon was the clear winner in terms of multi-server latency, however, with an average response time of 15 milliseconds, with the remaining providers posting figures between 23 and 32 milliseconds.
In other areas, all the vendors measured posted more or less the same data – video performance scores (measured by a cross-section of failure rates and average bitrates) were all within less than a percentage point, at a 0 -100 points total. Likewise, the report found that fixed broadband providers delivered a largely consistent experience of 25Mbps downlink and 3Mbps uplink. Spectrum topped the list with an overall score of 91%, and AT&T ranked fifth with an overall score of 82%. (The only outlier here is CenturyLink, at just 57%.)