Canada

Telus once again wins Opensignal's Video Experience award — the fifth win in a row. This means that our Telus users continue to enjoy the best quality of mobile video streaming experience in Canada. Telus' overall score this time is 72.7 points (on a 0-100 scale) which places it in the Very Good category. While Telus' score has dipped slightly — by 1.8 points — compared to our last report, Bell's diminished by 1.1 points. As a result, Bell has reduced the gap with Telus — 2.4 points to 1.8 points with 71 points. Meanwhile, Roger's Video Experience score remained statistically unchanged.

Video Experience – 5G Userstakes into account the average 3G and 4G Video Experience that 5G users see, as well as their average 5G Video Experience and the proportion of time that they spent connected to each type of network to reveal their overall video experience. Telus was the only Canadian operator to place in the Excellent (75 or above) category with a score of 75.5 points — both its rivals garnered Very Good (65-75) ratings instead.

An Excellent rating for Video Experience – 5G Users indicates a very consistent experience across all 5G users, video streaming providers and resolutions tested, with fast loading times and almost non-existent stalling. A Very Good rating, on the other hand, means that loading times were generally fast and that there was only occasional stalling, but the experience might have been somewhat inconsistent across 5G users and/or video providers/resolutions.

The three-way tie that our users observed in our last report has now turned into a two-way tie as Rogers and Telus jointly win our Games Experience award. This change was triggered due to the declines in scores reported by our users across the board — from 3.3 points on Rogers' network to 5.2 points on Bell's. Regardless, Our user had a Fair (65-75) Games Experience on all three operators' networks.

On Games Experience – 5G Users, Rogers' score achieves a Good (75-85) rating compared to Bell and Telus, who place in the Fair category. Rogers' score placed in the Good category means most 5G users on its network deemed the experience acceptable; it also indicates that the gameplay experience was generally controllable, with most 5G users receiving immediate feedback between their actions and the outcomes in the game. Higher scores mean users' experience becomes more enjoyable — improved with reduced delays and greater controllability in the gameplay. These results show that there is still some room for improvement when it comes to Games Experience in Canada, even for 5G users.

Opensignal's Games Experience quantifies the experience when playing real-time multiplayer mobile games on mobile devices connected to servers located around the world. The approach is built on several years of research, quantifying the relationship between technical network parameters and the gaming experience as reported by real mobile users. These parameters include latency (round trip time), jitter (variability of latency) and packet loss (the proportion of data packets that never reach their destination). Additionally, it considers multiple genres of multiplayer mobile games to measure the average sensitivity to network conditions. The games tested include some of the most popular real-time multiplayer mobile games (such as Fortnite, Pro Evolution Soccer and Arena of Valor) played around the world.

Telus holds on to the Voice App Experience award with a score of 78.4 points (out of 100). The operator's lead over its rivals has increased slightly on this measure since our last report, rising from at least 0.4 to at least 0.7 points. Telus' score places it in the Acceptable (74-80) category alongside Bell and Rogers. These changes have resulted from a 2.0-2.5 points decline reported by our users across the board.

However, when we look at the Voice App Experience – 5G User scores, only Rogers garnered a Good (80-87) rating, which means that many 5G users on its network were satisfied, although some may have experienced minor quality impairments such as clicking sounds or distortion. Opensignal's Voice App Experience reflects the use of over-the-top (OTT) voice communication apps, for example, Facebook Messenger, Skype or WhatsApp. The model characterizes the exact relationship between the technical measurements and perceived call quality using a model derived on the International Telecommunications Union approach.

Telus has once again retained the top spot for Download Speed Experience, as our users on its network observed the fastest download speeds in Canada, averaging a whopping 73.9 Mbps. As well, Telus' lead over second-placed Bell has widened by 0.6 Mbps to 4.1 Mbps (5.8%) as its score grew by 1.2 Mbps compared to a 0.5 Mbps increase in Bell's, since the last report. Meanwhile, our Rogers users saw their average download speeds decline by 2.4 Mbps to 57.5 Mbps.

The overall download speed experienced by 5G users — in other words, those mobile users with both a 5G smartphone model and a 5G plan — were staggering fast. Telus and Bell reached 112.2 Mbps and 110.7 Mbps, respectively, while Rogers was less than half a point short of the 80 Mbps mark.

The race for our Upload Speed Experience award in Canada remains highly competitive, with less than one Mbps separating all three operators' scores. Telus holds on to the award and leads with a score of 10.9 Mbps, followed by Rogers and Bell's score of 10.2 Mbps and 10 Mbps, respectively. Since the last report, the average upload speeds of our users dropped by 0.5 Mbps on Bell's network and 0.2 Mbps on Rogers and Telus' networks.

When we look at the overall upload speed experienced by 5G users, all three operators were statistically tied with scores around the 12 Mbps mark.

In our last report, we saw Rogers and Telus tied for first place in 4G Availability — a measure of the average proportion of time users spend connected to 4G — but this time around, Bell and Rogers are the new joint-winners. This is because Telus's score dropped by 1.7 percentage points, while those of Rogers and Bell diminished by 1.3 and 0.3 percentage points, respectively. As a result, 4G Availability in Canada now ranges between 92.3% and 92.8%.

Bell and Telus remain the joint winners of our 4G Coverage Experience award with two scores of 9.7 points (out of 10). Our users on all three networks reported a slight increase since the last report, while Bell and Telus's scores grew by 0.3%, Rogers' score improved by 0.9%.

While Opensignal's 4G Availability measures the proportion of time users spent connected to 4G, our 4G Coverage Experience metric is a measure of how mobile subscribers experience 4G coverage on an operator's network. Measured on a scale of 0-10, it analyzes the locations where customers of a network operator received a 4G signal relative to the locations visited by users of all network operators.