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In our previous report STC won the Games Experience award having displayed an impressive increase of 39.7%, which allowed the operator to rise above Mobily for the first time in this category. Now we have seen a comeback from the latter operator, as our users on Mobily saw a 10.3 points increase (23.7%) in their Games Experience score which pushed the operator once again to the top of this category, followed by STC in second place and Zain in third. Mobily also wins the Voice App Experience award after conceding the first place to STC in our previous two reports.
STC wins both Download Speed Experience and Upload Speed Experience but also increased its winning margin on second-placed Mobily in the former measure of the mobile experience. In fact, STC’s lead on Mobily grew from 5.3 Mbps to 7 Mbps in Download Speed Experience. STC remains the only Saudi operator to exceed the 30 Mbps mark in download speeds and the 10 Mbps mark in upload speeds but this time it was Zain seeing the largest improvement in Download Speed Experience.
Since our last report, our Zain users saw their 4G Availability score increase by 1.7 percentage points to 88.9%, ahead of STC at 88% and Mobily at 86.7%. Zain was the only Saudi mobile operator to see its 4G Availability score increase since our previous report, when just 1.6 percentage points separated the three operators. On the other hand, STC maintains a significant lead of 1.6-1.7 points (on a 10 point scale) ahead of Zain and Mobily in 4G Coverage Experience, as the two operators placed second and third, respectively.
STC wins the Video Experience award for the fifth time in a row, after sharing the award with Mobily in our first Saudi Arabia report. STC scored 67.9 points in Video Experience, followed by Mobily at 66 points and Zain at 60.2 points. Both STC and Mobily earned a Very Good score (65-75), while Zain achieved a Good score (55-65).
In our April Saudi Arabia report STC won all seven awards. This time we have seen a reshuffle of the winners in our awards table, as Mobily wins Games Experience and Voice App Experience, while Zain wins the 4G Availability award. STC successfully defended the remaining four awards — Video Experience, Download Speed Experience, Upload Speed Experience and 4G Coverage Experience.
In the second half of this year Mobily announced it did not reach an agreement to merge its tower infrastructure with Zain under a new entity, which was intended to provide wholesale infrastructure services to the two companies. This plan had previously been given in-principle approval by Saudi Arabia’s Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC).
However, CITC has completed the first two phases of its domestic roaming initiative that was initially launched in the Asir region earlier this year, enabling mobile users to connect to any available network in the event of a lack of connection on their own provider’s network. The initiative is targeting the implementation of national roaming across the rest of the country by the end of 2021.
In this report, we have analyzed the mobile network experience on the three national mobile operators — Mobily, STC and Zain — at the national level in the 90 days starting July 1, 2021 and ending on September 28, 2021. We have used 5G measurements in addition to those from previous generations of mobile network technology when determining the overall scores for each metric. We have also published a companion report — Saudi Arabia 5G Experience Report — which analyzes the experience of our 5G users when connected to 5G.
| Mobile Experience Awards Saudi Arabia | |||
|---|---|---|---|
October 2021,
Saudi Arabia Report
|
M
Mobily
|
S
STC
|
Z
Zain
|
Video Experience
| |||
Games Experience
| |||
Voice App Experience
| |||
Download Speed Experience
| |||
Upload Speed Experience
| |||
4G Availability
| |||
4G Coverage Experience
| |||
|
Mobile Experience Awards Winners
|
October 2021,
Saudi Arabia
|
|---|---|
|
Video Experience
|
S
STC
|
|
Games Experience
|
M
Mobily
|
|
Voice App Experience
|
M
Mobily
|
|
Download Speed Experience
|
S
STC
|
|
Upload Speed Experience
|
S
STC
|
|
4G Availability
|
Z
Zain
|
|
4G Coverage Experience
|
S
STC
|
STC wins our Video Experience award with a score of 67.9 points, and a lead of 1.9 points ahead of second-placed Mobily, up from 0.9 points in the previous report. This is the fifth time in a row that STC has won the Video Experience award outright, after sharing the win with Mobily in our first Saudi Arabia report. Both STC and Mobily scored in the Very Good (65-75) Video Experience category while Zain scored 60.2 points on our 100-point scale, which placed it in the Good category (55-65 points). However, looking at our 5G users, all three national operators placed in the Very Good (65-75) category for Video Experience – 5G Users, with STC scoring 74.1 points, while Mobily and Zain had statistically tied scores of 72.9 points and 73 points, respectively.
|
Video Experience
Additional Metrics |
M
Mobily
|
S
STC
|
Z
Zain
|
|---|---|---|---|
| in 0-100 points | |||
|
Video Experience – 5G Users
| 72.9 (± 0.99) | 74.1 (± 0.58) | 73.0 (± 1.03) |
| Video Experience – 5G Users | in 0-100 points |
|
M
Mobily
|
73 (± 0.99) |
|
S
STC
|
74 (± 0.58) |
|
Z
Zain
|
73 (± 1.03) |
Opensignal’s Video Experience metric quantifies the quality of video streamed to mobile devices by measuring real-world video streams over an operator's networks. To calculate video experience, we are directly measuring video streams from end-user devices and using this ITU-based approach to quantify the overall video experience for each operator on a scale from 0 to 100. The videos tested include a mixture of resolutions and are streamed directly from the world’s largest video content providers.
In the past six months we observed an impressive improvement on our users’ Games Experience on Mobily’s network, which allowed the operator to win back the award from STC. Mobily’s score increased from 43.2 points in our previous report to the current 53.5 points on a 100-point scale — a rise of 10.3 points. Conversely, we observed a decrease of 4.8 points on STC’s network after showing a 15 points improvement in our previous report — when STC claimed the Games Experience award from Mobily. In this report STC scored 48 points — 5.5 points behind Mobily — while Zain’s score remained statistically unchanged at 34.8 points.
|
Games Experience
Additional Metrics |
M
Mobily
|
S
STC
|
Z
Zain
|
|---|---|---|---|
| in 0-100 points | |||
|
Games Experience – 5G Users
| 60.8 (± 1.34) | 56.8 (± 1.23) | 38.9 (± 0.73) |
| Games Experience – 5G Users | in 0-100 points |
|
M
Mobily
|
61 (± 1.34) |
|
S
STC
|
57 (± 1.23) |
|
Z
Zain
|
39 (± 0.73) |
Opensignal’s Games Experience is a measure of how mobile users experience real-time multiplayer mobile gaming on an operator’s network. Measured on a scale of 0-100, it analyzes how the multiplayer mobile gaming experience is affected by mobile network conditions including latency, packet loss and jitter.
Mobily wins the Voice App Experience award with a 1.8 point lead on STC, which had claimed the two previous awards. Both Mobily and STC placed in the Acceptable category (74-80), while Zain followed at a distance with a score of 67.6 points, which placed it into the Poor category (66-74).
|
Voice App Experience
Additional Metrics |
M
Mobily
|
S
STC
|
Z
Zain
|
|---|---|---|---|
| in 0-100 points | |||
|
Voice App Experience – 5G Users
| 78.8 (± 0.55) | 77.9 (± 0.49) | 74.1 (± 0.86) |
| Voice App Experience – 5G Users | in 0-100 points |
|
M
Mobily
|
79 (± 0.55) |
|
S
STC
|
78 (± 0.49) |
|
Z
Zain
|
74 (± 0.86) |
Opensignal's Voice App Experience measures the quality of experience for over-the-top (OTT) voice services — mobile voice apps such as WhatsApp, Skype, Facebook Messenger etc. — using a model derived from the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) approach for quantifying overall voice call quality and a series of calibrated technical parameters. This model characterizes the exact relationship between the technical measurements and perceived call quality. Voice App Experience for each operator is calculated on a scale from 0 to 100.
STC kept hold of our Download Speed Experience award having scored 34.3 Mbps — a 2.1 Mbps increase compared to our last report. However, this time it was on Zain that we observed the largest improvement across our users’ average download speeds. The operator’s score clocked a 3.9 Mbps rise (24.4%), bringing it ever so close to the 20 Mbps mark in Download Speed Experience. Our users’ Download Speed Experience on Mobily’s network improved by a lesser degree in comparison — 0.4 Mbps — but still placed Mobily 7.4 Mbps ahead of Zain at 27.3 Mbps.
|
Download Speed Experience
Additional Metrics |
M
Mobily
|
S
STC
|
Z
Zain
|
|---|---|---|---|
| in Mbps | |||
|
Download Speed Experience – 5G Users
| 118.1 (± 6.42) | 165.6 (± 5.01) | 160.3 (± 12.06) |
| Download Speed Experience – 5G Users | in Mbps |
|
M
Mobily
|
118 (± 6.42) |
|
S
STC
|
166 (± 5.01) |
|
Z
Zain
|
160 (± 12.06) |
Looking at the overall download speeds as experienced by our 5G users, we saw statistically tied scores of 165.6 Mbps and 160.3 Mbps on STC and Zain’s networks, respectively. On the other hand, our 5G users on Mobily on average experienced 118.1 Mbps in download speeds. In our recent 5G Global Mobile Network Experience Awards report all three Saudi operators were recognized among the global operators showing the largest improvement in 5G download speeds compared to 4G, as well as Global Leaders for 5G Availability. This explains the impressive increase in Download Speed Experience for our 5G users compared to the overall scores that include all our users.
Notably, this time we observed improvements in the average upload speeds experienced by our users on all three national mobile operators, while in the previous report STC’s score remained statistically unchanged. STC increased its winning edge having scored 10.9 Mbps in Upload Speed Experience, up from 10.3 Mbps in our previous report. Mobily placed second with a score of 8.3 Mbps, which marked an improvement of 0.5 Mbps, while Zain followed at 7.4 Mbps showing a 0.4 Mbps rise compared to our previous report.
|
Upload Speed Experience
Additional Metrics |
M
Mobily
|
S
STC
|
Z
Zain
|
|---|---|---|---|
| in Mbps | |||
|
Upload Speed Experience – 5G Users
| 13.9 (± 0.68) | 18.7 (± 0.55) | 16.6 (± 1.13) |
| Upload Speed Experience – 5G Users | in Mbps |
|
M
Mobily
|
14 (± 0.68) |
|
S
STC
|
19 (± 0.55) |
|
Z
Zain
|
17 (± 1.13) |
When we focus on the overall upload speeds as experienced by our 5G users, STC, Zain and Mobily scored 18.7 Mbps, 16.6 Mbps and 13.9 Mbps, respectively. Zain was recognized in our 5G Global Mobile Network Experience Awards report for Upload Speed — Global 5G Impact, which measured the uplift in upload speeds experienced by our users on 5G compared to 4G.
Zain has retaken the 4G Availability award, after conceding it to STC in the previous three reports in a row. In this report, Zain scored 88.9% in 4G Availability, up from 87.2%, while both STC and Mobily saw their scores reduce slightly. In fact, STC’s 4G Availability decreased from 88.8% to 88%, while our Mobily users’ time connected to 4G changed from 87.8% to 86.7%. Once again, the relatively small gap between the three mobile operators’ scores — this time just 2.2 percentage points — means that the competition for this award is tight and small movements could lead to a different set of results next time.
Our users’ 4G Coverage Experience showed relatively little change compared to our previous report as the largest improvement we observed was 0.2 points on a scale of 0-10. STC led in this award category with a score of 8.7 points, up from 8.6 points recorded in our previous report. Zain placed second with a score of 7.1 points, which was statistically unchanged compared to our last report. Our users on Mobily saw the largest improvement of 0.2 points as Mobily’s 4G Coverage Experience score increased from 6.8 points to 7 points.
Opensignal's 4G Coverage Experience is a measure of how Opensignal's 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 Opensignal users of all network operators.
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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