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UAE surpassed the 90% 4G Availability milestone. Etisalat held onto our 4G Availability award, increasing its score by 3.6 percentage points to reach 93.1% in the past six months . But du also saw its score jump by 3.3 percentage points, as both operators passed the 90% national 4G Availability milestone. Etisalat also won our inaugural 4G Coverage Experience in the country with a score of 9.6 (on a 10-point scale), while du was slightly lower with a score of 9.2 points.
Etisalat continues to beat its rival in Download Speed Experience with a score of 40.5 Mbps. This was 68.5% faster than du which had a score of 24.0. Etisalat also triumphed in Upload Speed Experience with a winning score of 11.6 Mbps — 40.8% faster than that of du.
Both Etisalat and du improved their scores in Video Experience. Etisalat maintained its lead in this category with a score of 74.1. This was a 5-point improvement (on a 100-point scale) over the last report and was just about a point shy from earning an Excellent rating. Meanwhile, du improved its score by almost 4 points to join Etisalat in the Very Good range (65-75) with a score of 68.2. This means that our users across the UAE now enjoy short load times and minimal stalling during playback, even at higher video resolutions.
Our Latency Experience metric is a measure of network responsiveness — meaning the lower the score, the better. Etisalat won our Latency Experience award with a score of 34.2ms, which isa slight improvement to its score in the past six months to bring our users’ experience closer to the 30 millisecond milestone. However, our users on du now see a longer network response time, as the operator's Latency Experience Score deteriorated by slightly more than 5ms for a score of 46.9ms.
It was a close call in our new measure of Games Experience, while du finished in the first place with a score of 38.5, Etisalat followed closely only 3.5 points behind (on a 100-point scale) with a score of 35.0. However, with scores below 40 points, both operators ended up with a Very Poor rating, which indicates that users on both networks would benefit from measures that remove noticeable delays within games and help players feel like they always have control over the gameplay.
In our latest look at the UAE mobile market, Etisalat’s dominance continues to prevail in mobile network experience. It won six out of our eight award categories and also established a new benchmark in Download Speed Experience with speeds averaging above 40 Mbps. In this report we also observed that users in the UAE are finding it increasingly easier to get a 4G connection as both operators have now passed the 90% 4G Availability mark.
As 4G connectivity becomes more ubiquitous, the country is turning its attention to 5G. In November last year both the operators — Etisalat and du — were allocated frequencies in the 3.3GHz-3.8GHz spectrum range with 100 MHz blocks each to establish their 5G networks, and both operators launched their 5G services in the middle of 2019. Besides the frequencies mentioned above, the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) is also looking to assign further spectrum in the 24.25GHz-27.5GHz bands for 5G use ahead of the Dubai 2020 Expo, while it could also assign spectrum above 40GHz after 2020.
To understand the true user experience as the usage of the new technology grows, we have included our 5G users’ measurements in our overall experience categories.
| Mobile Experience Awards United Arab Emirates | ||
|---|---|---|
April 2020,
United Arab Emirates Report
|
E
Etisalat
|
d
du
|
Video Experience
| ||
Games Experience
| ||
Voice App Experience
| ||
Download Speed Experience
| ||
Upload Speed Experience
| ||
Latency Experience
| ||
4G Availability
| ||
4G Coverage Experience
| ||
|
Mobile Experience Awards Winners
|
April 2020,
United Arab Emirates
|
|---|---|
|
Video Experience
|
E
Etisalat
|
|
Games Experience
|
d
du
|
|
Voice App Experience
|
d
du
|
|
Download Speed Experience
|
E
Etisalat
|
|
Upload Speed Experience
|
E
Etisalat
|
|
Latency Experience
|
E
Etisalat
|
|
4G Availability
|
E
Etisalat
|
|
4G Coverage Experience
|
E
Etisalat
|
|
Video Experience
Additional Metrics |
E
Etisalat
|
d
du
|
|---|---|---|
| in 0-100 points | ||
|
4G Video Experience
| 75.9 (± 0.53) | 71.5 (± 0.67) |
|
3G Video Experience
| 63.7 (± 2.15) | 54.8 (± 2.19) |
| 4G Video Experience | in 0-100 points |
|
E
Etisalat
|
76 (± 0.53) |
|
d
du
|
71 (± 0.67) |
| 3G Video Experience | in 0-100 points |
|
E
Etisalat
|
64 (± 2.15) |
|
d
du
|
55 (± 2.19) |
|
Games Experience
Additional Metrics |
E
Etisalat
|
d
du
|
|---|---|---|
| in 0-100 points | ||
|
4G Games Experience
| 35.4 (± 0.10) | 39.0 (± 0.14) |
|
3G Games Experience
| 32.5 (± 0.31) | 36.2 (± 0.39) |
| 4G Games Experience | in 0-100 points |
|
E
Etisalat
|
35 (± 0.10) |
|
d
du
|
39 (± 0.14) |
| 3G Games Experience | in 0-100 points |
|
E
Etisalat
|
33 (± 0.31) |
|
d
du
|
36 (± 0.39) |
|
Voice App Experience
Additional Metrics |
E
Etisalat
|
d
du
|
|---|---|---|
| in 0-100 points | ||
|
4G Voice App Experience
| 44.4 (± 0.22) | 65.3 (± 0.40) |
|
3G Voice App Experience
| 40.7 (± 0.71) | 59.8 (± 1.10) |
| 4G Voice App Experience | in 0-100 points |
|
E
Etisalat
|
44 (± 0.22) |
|
d
du
|
65 (± 0.40) |
| 3G Voice App Experience | in 0-100 points |
|
E
Etisalat
|
41 (± 0.71) |
|
d
du
|
60 (± 1.10) |
|
Download Speed Experience
Additional Metrics |
E
Etisalat
|
d
du
|
|---|---|---|
| in Mbps | ||
|
4G Download Speed
| 45.7 (± 0.65) | 28.1 (± 0.48) |
|
3G Download Speed
| 9.5 (± 0.35) | 6.7 (± 0.29) |
| 4G Download Speed | in Mbps |
|
E
Etisalat
|
46 (± 0.65) |
|
d
du
|
28 (± 0.48) |
| 3G Download Speed | in Mbps |
|
E
Etisalat
|
10 (± 0.35) |
|
d
du
|
7 (± 0.29) |
|
Upload Speed Experience
Additional Metrics |
E
Etisalat
|
d
du
|
|---|---|---|
| in Mbps | ||
|
4G Upload Speed
| 13.2 (± 0.20) | 9.9 (± 0.20) |
|
3G Upload Speed
| 2.1 (± 0.08) | 1.3 (± 0.06) |
| 4G Upload Speed | in Mbps |
|
E
Etisalat
|
13 (± 0.20) |
|
d
du
|
10 (± 0.20) |
| 3G Upload Speed | in Mbps |
|
E
Etisalat
|
2 (± 0.08) |
|
d
du
|
1 (± 0.06) |
|
Latency Experience
Additional Metrics |
E
Etisalat
|
d
du
|
|---|---|---|
| in ms | ||
|
4G Latency
| 32.5 (± 0.15) | 45.5 (± 0.27) |
|
3G Latency
| 44.1 (± 0.83) | 52.9 (± 0.77) |
| 4G Latency | in ms |
|
E
Etisalat
|
32 (± 0.15) |
|
d
du
|
45 (± 0.27) |
| 3G Latency | in ms |
|
E
Etisalat
|
44 (± 0.83) |
|
d
du
|
53 (± 0.77) |
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.
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