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EE swept the board in our analysis, winning all five national award categories. The operator also dominated our regional analysis, coming top in two-thirds of our regional awards and scoring a draw in almost all the others.
EE scraped a win over Vodafone in our Video Experience category, with both operators scoring a Very Good rating with scores above 65. The two had almost identical scores in our 4G Video Experience measurements, while Vodafone was slightly ahead in 3G Video Experience. But EE's superior 4G Availability allowed it to grab our overall Video Experience award.
EE topped both our Download Speed Experience and 4G Availability categories. It fell just short of the 30 Mbps mark in the first category, and its 4G Availability score nearly reached 90%. In a quarter of the U.K.'s regions, EE has already passed each of these milestones, and we expect the operator to achieve them on a national level in our next report.
EE's award-winning Download and Upload Speed Experience scores were over 20% faster than its closest rival's. And the operator is pulling ahead of the pack. It grew its Download Speed Experience score by over 3 Mbps, while its 4G Upload Speed grew by more than 10% — the greatest growth in these categories among the U.K.'s operators.
In our latest look at the U.K. mobile market, it's getting pretty hard to see beyond the dominance of a single operator. EE has ruled the awards tables in our last few reports on the U.K. market, but this time the operator has scored a clean sweep. EE won all five of our national awards, while it scooped two-thirds of our regional medals and tied for the win in most of the others. And our measurements show the operator is pulling further ahead of the pack in several key areas, including Download Speed Experience and 4G Availability.
In this report, we've analyzed the mobile network experience of the four main operators in the U.K., 3, EE, O2, and Vodafone in the 90 days from December 1, 2018. We've looked at how the operators stack up both at the national level and across 12 regions including Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. While EE dominated our awards, we've seen encouraging signs of improvement across the board from the other operators.
| Mobile Experience Awards United Kingdom | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
April 2019,
United Kingdom Report
|
O
O2
|
V
Vodafone
|
3
3
|
E
EE
|
4G Availability
| ||||
Video Experience
| ||||
Download Speed Experience
| ||||
Upload Speed Experience
| ||||
Latency Experience
| ||||
|
Mobile Experience Awards Winners
|
April 2019,
United Kingdom
|
|---|---|
|
4G Availability
|
E
EE
|
|
Video Experience
|
E
EE
|
|
Download Speed Experience
|
E
EE
|
|
Upload Speed Experience
|
E
EE
|
|
Latency Experience
|
E
EE
|
EE has grown its lead in our 4G Availability metric, and the operator is now a clear 5 percentage points ahead of its rivals. EE's score is now approaching the 90% mark — indeed, the operator has passed this landmark in some of the U.K.'s regions (see Regional Analysis, below).
While EE's 4G Availability score showed the largest increase in our measurements, two of the U.K.'s other operators, 3 and Vodafone, have seen their scores rise by over 2 percentage points since our last report, while O2's score stayed virtually static.
EE won our Video Experience award by a nose, with a score of 68.5 (out-of-100) — narrowly beating Vodafone's 67.2. The other two operators, 3 and O2, were both within 5 points of Vodafone with Video Experience scores in the low 60s.
|
Video Experience
Additional Metrics |
O
O2
|
V
Vodafone
|
3
3
|
E
EE
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| in 0-100 points | ||||
|
4G Video Experience
| 67.2 (± 0.53) | 71.0 (± 0.42) | 66.8 (± 0.47) | 71.3 (± 0.30) |
|
3G Video Experience
| 45.8 (± 1.84) | 48.7 (± 1.53) | 49.9 (± 1.04) | 45.3 (± 1.62) |
| 4G Video Experience | in 0-100 points |
|
O
O2
|
67 (± 0.53) |
|
V
Vodafone
|
71 (± 0.42) |
|
3
3
|
67 (± 0.47) |
|
E
EE
|
71 (± 0.30) |
| 3G Video Experience | in 0-100 points |
|
O
O2
|
46 (± 1.84) |
|
V
Vodafone
|
49 (± 1.53) |
|
3
3
|
50 (± 1.04) |
|
E
EE
|
45 (± 1.62) |
Interestingly, EE and Vodafone had almost identical scores in our 4G Video Experience measurements, while Vodafone was slightly ahead in 3G Video Experience. But EE's superior 4G Availability meant more of our users on its network were able to watch video over 4G more of the time rather than on 3G, allowing the operator to grab our overall Video Experience award.
Our top two operators EE and Vodafone both scored in the Very Good category in our Video Experience rankings, which generally means that video streamed to mobile devices from the internet exhibits fast loading times and only occasional stalling. But 3 and O2's scores dropped the operators into our Good category, meaning that users are likely seeing longer load times before playback begins and more stalling, especially at higher resolutions.
Nonetheless, to have all four operators score over 60 in our Video Experience measurements — and two operators in the Very Good category — is no mean feat. It shows that our users on the U.K.'s mobile networks are enjoying a pretty decent mobile Video Experience.
EE's Download Speed Experience award-winning score was nearly 41% faster than its closest rival. And the operator is pulling further ahead of its closest competitors, as its score grew by over 3 Mbps since our last report. Vodafone put in a sprint of just under 3 Mbps, but the gap between the runner-up and the leader has still widened. It was 3, though, who saw the greatest growth in Download Speed Experience, increasing its score by over 15% in the past six months.
|
Download Speed Experience
Additional Metrics |
O
O2
|
V
Vodafone
|
3
3
|
E
EE
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| in Mbps | ||||
|
4G Download Speed
| 15.8 (± 0.23) | 24.3 (± 0.35) | 21.6 (± 0.25) | 32.5 (± 0.32) |
|
3G Download Speed
| 4.9 (± 0.17) | 4.9 (± 0.13) | 8.0 (± 0.14) | 5.8 (± 0.17) |
| 4G Download Speed | in Mbps |
|
O
O2
|
16 (± 0.23) |
|
V
Vodafone
|
24 (± 0.35) |
|
3
3
|
22 (± 0.25) |
|
E
EE
|
33 (± 0.32) |
| 3G Download Speed | in Mbps |
|
O
O2
|
5 (± 0.17) |
|
V
Vodafone
|
5 (± 0.13) |
|
3
3
|
8 (± 0.14) |
|
E
EE
|
6 (± 0.17) |
EE's 4G Download Speed score was also over a third faster than its nearest rival, and also grew by more than 3 Mbps in the past six months. EE is now nearly 9 Mbps clear of its closest rival, having become the first U.K. operator to pass the 30 Mbps mark at a national level in our 4G Download Speed measurements.
Notably EE's 3G Download Speed has dropped significantly since our last report, while its rivals' scores have all stayed pretty much the same in our measurements. As EE approaches 90% 4G Availability, the operator may be reallocating 3G network resources to its LTE users.
EE was head and shoulders above the competition in Upload Speed Experience, winning our award with a score over 2 Mbps faster than any of its rivals. EE won with a score of 9.4 Mbps, beating Vodafone's 7.3 Mbps, while 3 and O2 brought up the rear with scores of 6.5 Mbps and 6.3 Mbps respectively.
|
Upload Speed Experience
Additional Metrics |
O
O2
|
V
Vodafone
|
3
3
|
E
EE
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| in Mbps | ||||
|
4G Upload Speed
| 7.2 (± 0.11) | 8.5 (± 0.12) | 8.3 (± 0.11) | 10.4 (± 0.13) |
|
3G Upload Speed
| 1.4 (± 0.08) | 1.3 (± 0.06) | 1.6 (± 0.03) | 1.5 (± 0.08) |
| 4G Upload Speed | in Mbps |
|
O
O2
|
7 (± 0.11) |
|
V
Vodafone
|
9 (± 0.12) |
|
3
3
|
8 (± 0.11) |
|
E
EE
|
10 (± 0.13) |
| 3G Upload Speed | in Mbps |
|
O
O2
|
1 (± 0.08) |
|
V
Vodafone
|
1 (± 0.06) |
|
3
3
|
2 (± 0.03) |
|
E
EE
|
1 (± 0.08) |
EE was also dominant in 4G Upload Speed, seeing the greatest growth among the U.K.'s operators. EE's score grew by over 1 Mbps to 10.4 Mbps, putting it nearly 2 Mbps clear of the pack — and making it the first U.K. operator to pass the 10 Mbps mark. All of the U.K.'s operators saw a little growth in our 4G Upload Speed measurements, but once again EE is pulling further ahead of the pack.
Looking at 3G Upload Speed scores, there wasn't much in it, with all four operators coming within 0.3 Mbps of each other, and all four scoring under 2 Mbps. Again this seems to suggest that they may be reallocating network resources to faster 4G networks as 3G becomes increasingly obsolete.
EE won our Latency Experience award, but with a slightly less comfortable lead than in our speed metrics. Nevertheless, its winning score of 40.7 milliseconds was a clear 4ms better than its closest rival. O2 and Vodafone were neck-and-neck with scores close to 45ms, while 3 was some way behind with a latency score of 52.4 ms.
|
Latency Experience
Additional Metrics |
O
O2
|
V
Vodafone
|
3
3
|
E
EE
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| in ms | ||||
|
4G Latency
| 39.2 (± 0.21) | 41.2 (± 0.19) | 48.7 (± 0.17) | 37.9 (± 0.19) |
|
3G Latency
| 79.8 (± 1.39) | 62.9 (± 1.09) | 62.5 (± 0.61) | 63.1 (± 1.21) |
| 4G Latency | in ms |
|
O
O2
|
39 (± 0.21) |
|
V
Vodafone
|
41 (± 0.19) |
|
3
3
|
49 (± 0.17) |
|
E
EE
|
38 (± 0.19) |
| 3G Latency | in ms |
|
O
O2
|
80 (± 1.39) |
|
V
Vodafone
|
63 (± 1.09) |
|
3
3
|
63 (± 0.61) |
|
E
EE
|
63 (± 1.21) |
In 4G Latency, O2's score was much closer to EE's than in our overall Latency Experience measurements. But O2's 3G Latency score was way behind its rivals, and this combined with a weaker 4G Availability score meant EE was able to secure our overall Latency Experience crown.
EE's dominance of our awards continued in our analysis of the U.K.'s 12 regions. The operator won 40 out of our 60 regional awards outright, and tied in a further 17. EE scored a clean sweep of our awards in the Eastern, East Midlands and South East regions, and was only denied a clean sweep in London by a draw with Vodafone in Video Experience.
EE passed the 30 Mbps Download Speed Experience milestone in four regions including London, with a highly impressive score of 34.9 Mbps in the capital — the highest we have ever measured in the U.K. EE also broke the 90% 4G Availability milestone in London and three other regions.
Despite the high scores in London, there was little evidence of the so-called North/South divide in our mobile network measurements, with some of our top scores appearing in the North East, North West, West Midlands and Yorkshire and Humber regions. Indeed, our recent analysis of 4G speeds in the U.K.'s largest cities found Bristol, Cardiff and Birmingham topped the table, with London distinctly mid-table.
Select any region or city below to display individual breakdown
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