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Grameenphone bagged the award in our one-of-a-kind Video Experience category with 49.4 points and was closely followed by Banglalink at 48 points. That said, all four national operators in Bangladesh earned a Fair Video Experience rating (40-55) on our 100-point scale. This means that irrespective of the choice of operator, our users in Bangladesh suffered sluggish video load times accompanied by stops and stutters mid-stream to varying degrees, especially at higher resolutions.
Banglalink’s score of 71.5 out of 100 leads our unique measure of Voice App Experience that quantifies the quality of consumers’ experience for over-the-top (OTT) voice services using apps like WhatsApp, Skype and Facebook Messenger. The typical Voice App Experience in Bangladesh can vary from Very Poor to Poor, depending on the operator. While Banglalink, Grameenphone and Airtel earned a Poor rating (66-74), Robi was the only one to end up in the Very Poor rating bracket (60-66) with 63.6 points. A Poor rating signifies that many users are dissatisfied and suffer perceptible call quality impairments accompanied by distortions, while a Very Poor rating signifies that most users are dissatisfied and suffer significant call quality impairments accompanied by more occasional instances of distortion, clicking sounds or silence experienced during the call. It can be difficult to understand parts of the conversation without repetition.
In our overall Download Speed Experience measurements, Grameenphone and Banglalink ended up in a dead heat, as our users on both networks experienced overall download speeds of 7.2 Mbps on average. Our users enjoyed the second-best Download Speed Experience on Airtel’s network — the operator was just 1 Mbps short of the leaders.
Airtel and Grameenphone were the only operators in Bangladesh to score above 75% in 4G Availability, which means that our users, on average, were able to connect to 4G services more than 75% of the time on both networks. On the other hand, Robi was little more than a point shy from the 75% mark, while Banglalink dropped further down with 65.4%.
Grameenphone won our Upload and Latency Experience awards. The operator took a substantial lead over second-paced Banglalink in both categories. Its Upload Speed Experience score of 3 Mbps was at least 30% faster, and its Latency Experience score of 56.6 milliseconds was more than 6ms faster than its closest rival. While more attention is typically given to download speeds, upload speeds are also becoming important as users’ habits are shifting from mere content consumption to content creation and content sharing. So is the case with latency, which affects mobile data experience in many subtle ways: lower latencies translate to a better experience on a host of mobile applications and services like Voice-over-IP, live video streaming, and real-time multiplayer gaming.
In our first look at Bangladesh’s mobile network market, Opensignal found an operator landscape characterized by fierce competition and opportunities. In almost all the categories we found at least three out of four operators challenging each other to offer the best network experience. And this, in turn, can be attributed directly or indirectly to Bangladesh’s young and evolving mobile ecosystem. The country launched its first 3G services in2013, and its first 4G services in2018. When you couple this with the country's current mobile internet penetration of approximately 52%, it reveals the ample opportunities that are available to the existing market players.
Despite 4G technology being in its early phases, it has been rapidly rolled out in the country, as our Bangladeshi users saw their 4G Availability ranging between 65% and nearly 80%, depending on the choice of operators. At the same time, on our other measurements, the operators have a lot of opportunity to enhance the user experience on their networks and to enable the country to catch up with its regional peers, as seen in our global reports.
In this report, we examined the mobile network experience of the four main mobile operators — Airtel, Banglalink, Grameenphone and Robi (we are treating Airtel and Robi as individual operators, as they are operating as separate consumer brands) for a period of 90 days beginning October 1, 2019, to see how they fared on our real-world measurements.
| Mobile Experience Awards Bangladesh | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
February 2020,
Bangladesh Report
|
G
Grameenphone
|
R
Robi
|
B
Banglalink
|
A
Airtel
|
Video Experience
| ||||
Voice App Experience
| ||||
Download Speed Experience
| ||||
Upload Speed Experience
| ||||
Latency Experience
| ||||
4G Availability
| ||||
4G Coverage Experience
| ||||
|
Mobile Experience Awards Winners
|
February 2020,
Bangladesh
|
|---|---|
|
Video Experience
|
G
Grameenphone
|
|
Voice App Experience
|
B
Banglalink
|
|
Upload Speed Experience
|
G
Grameenphone
|
|
Latency Experience
|
G
Grameenphone
|
|
Mobile Experience Awards Draws
|
February 2020, Bangladesh
|
|---|---|
|
Download Speed Experience
|
G
Grameenphone
B
Banglalink
|
|
4G Availability
|
G
Grameenphone
A
Airtel
|
|
4G Coverage Experience
|
G
Grameenphone
R
Robi
A
Airtel
|
|
Video Experience
Additional Metrics |
G
Grameenphone
|
R
Robi
|
B
Banglalink
|
A
Airtel
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| in 0-100 points | ||||
|
4G Video Experience
| 64.3 (± 0.63) | 56.3 (± 0.81) | 66.4 (± 1.20) | 56.2 (± 0.93) |
|
3G Video Experience
| 35.5 (± 0.89) | 35.1 (± 1.05) | 39.0 (± 1.02) | 38.3 (± 1.21) |
| 4G Video Experience | in 0-100 points |
|
G
Grameenphone
|
64 (± 0.63) |
|
R
Robi
|
56 (± 0.81) |
|
B
Banglalink
|
66 (± 1.20) |
|
A
Airtel
|
56 (± 0.93) |
| 3G Video Experience | in 0-100 points |
|
G
Grameenphone
|
35 (± 0.89) |
|
R
Robi
|
35 (± 1.05) |
|
B
Banglalink
|
39 (± 1.02) |
|
A
Airtel
|
38 (± 1.21) |
Video.
|
Voice App Experience
Additional Metrics |
G
Grameenphone
|
R
Robi
|
B
Banglalink
|
A
Airtel
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| in 0-100 points | ||||
|
4G Voice App Experience
| 71.7 (± 0.47) | 68.8 (± 0.75) | 79.0 (± 0.57) | 71.1 (± 0.69) |
|
3G Voice App Experience
| 60.7 (± 0.68) | 59.2 (± 0.97) | 67.8 (± 0.74) | 64.9 (± 1.07) |
| 4G Voice App Experience | in 0-100 points |
|
G
Grameenphone
|
72 (± 0.47) |
|
R
Robi
|
69 (± 0.75) |
|
B
Banglalink
|
79 (± 0.57) |
|
A
Airtel
|
71 (± 0.69) |
| 3G Voice App Experience | in 0-100 points |
|
G
Grameenphone
|
61 (± 0.68) |
|
R
Robi
|
59 (± 0.97) |
|
B
Banglalink
|
68 (± 0.74) |
|
A
Airtel
|
65 (± 1.07) |
Voice.
|
Download Speed Experience
Additional Metrics |
G
Grameenphone
|
R
Robi
|
B
Banglalink
|
A
Airtel
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| in Mbps | ||||
|
4G Download Speed
| 10.6 (± 0.11) | 8.4 (± 0.15) | 13.0 (± 0.25) | 8.4 (± 0.17) |
|
3G Download Speed
| 4.0 (± 0.05) | 3.8 (± 0.06) | 4.4 (± 0.07) | 4.3 (± 0.08) |
| 4G Download Speed | in Mbps |
|
G
Grameenphone
|
11 (± 0.11) |
|
R
Robi
|
8 (± 0.15) |
|
B
Banglalink
|
13 (± 0.25) |
|
A
Airtel
|
8 (± 0.17) |
| 3G Download Speed | in Mbps |
|
G
Grameenphone
|
4 (± 0.05) |
|
R
Robi
|
4 (± 0.06) |
|
B
Banglalink
|
4 (± 0.07) |
|
A
Airtel
|
4 (± 0.08) |
|
Upload Speed Experience
Additional Metrics |
G
Grameenphone
|
R
Robi
|
B
Banglalink
|
A
Airtel
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| in Mbps | ||||
|
4G Upload Speed
| 5.2 (± 0.06) | 3.4 (± 0.07) | 5.1 (± 0.12) | 3.5 (± 0.08) |
|
3G Upload Speed
| 1.0 (± 0.02) | 0.8 (± 0.02) | 0.9 (± 0.02) | 0.8 (± 0.02) |
| 4G Upload Speed | in Mbps |
|
G
Grameenphone
|
5 (± 0.06) |
|
R
Robi
|
3 (± 0.07) |
|
B
Banglalink
|
5 (± 0.12) |
|
A
Airtel
|
4 (± 0.08) |
| 3G Upload Speed | in Mbps |
|
G
Grameenphone
|
1 (± 0.02) |
|
R
Robi
|
1 (± 0.02) |
|
B
Banglalink
|
1 (± 0.02) |
|
A
Airtel
|
1 (± 0.02) |
|
Latency Experience
Additional Metrics |
G
Grameenphone
|
R
Robi
|
B
Banglalink
|
A
Airtel
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| in ms | ||||
|
4G Latency
| 39.9 (± 0.29) | 57.9 (± 0.65) | 34.1 (± 0.46) | 57.0 (± 0.72) |
|
3G Latency
| 72.2 (± 0.63) | 77.2 (± 0.81) | 77.0 (± 0.89) | 75.1 (± 0.89) |
| 4G Latency | in ms |
|
G
Grameenphone
|
40 (± 0.29) |
|
R
Robi
|
58 (± 0.65) |
|
B
Banglalink
|
34 (± 0.46) |
|
A
Airtel
|
57 (± 0.72) |
| 3G Latency | in ms |
|
G
Grameenphone
|
72 (± 0.63) |
|
R
Robi
|
77 (± 0.81) |
|
B
Banglalink
|
77 (± 0.89) |
|
A
Airtel
|
75 (± 0.89) |
Collecting billions of individual measurements daily from over 100 million devices globally, Opensignal independently analyzes mobile user experience on every major network operator around the globe.
Opensignal is the mobile analytics company committed to improving mobile connectivity across the globe. We are the independent authority for understanding the true experience consumers receive on wireless networks.
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