Canada’s LTE coverage ranked 21st globally

Canada has the 21st best LTE coverage in the world, according to a report released Wednesday, putting it one spot behind Hungary and one position ahead of Georgia. The report from OpenSignal Inc. looked at the signals received by hundreds of thousands of mobile-device users around the world. In Canada, the mobile devices monitored between June and August picked up LTE signals 70 per cent of the time. OpenSignal is a U.K.-based company that offers an app for devices running on Google Inc.'s Android software and Apple Inc.'s iOS system, which gives users information about the connectivity available to them. The report included data from 325,221 app users on Android devices, OpenSignal said in its report. OpenSignal spokeswoman Teresa Murphy-Skvorzova said in an email that data from iOS devices were not included because of technical reasons. The top country for LTE coverage was South Korea, where users received an LTE connection 97 per cent of the time. Japan was second at 90 per cent, followed by Hong Kong and Kuwait, both at 86 per cent. The United States was 10th, as users there were on LTE networks 78 per cent of the time. China was 12th with 76 per cent. Some G7 European countries had coverage rates that were considerably lower than Canada’s. Germany, which had a 53 per cent rate, tied with Spain and the Czech Republic for the 45th position. The United Kingdom had 50 per cent coverage, which put it in 51st place, tied with India and Brazil. OpenSignal CEO Brendan Gill said that, generally, LTE coverage tends to be highest in advanced economies with dense populations. He said Canada's low population density is likely a factor in why it has less LTE coverage than many other countries. Still, he compared it to the "frustrating" lack of LTE he experiences in his own homeland of the U.K. "In the scale of things, I think for a country like Canada, that is a respectable performance," he said in a phone interview. Within Canada, the report found that users on Rogers Communications Inc.'s network were on LTE 76 per cent of the time, the most of any Canadian carrier. Those using Quebecor Inc.'s Videotron service had LTE connections 75 per cent of the time, which ranked it second-best among Canadian service providers. Ironically, Telus Corp.'s discount brand Koodo Mobile ranked in third place, ahead of Telus' main service. Kodoo customers were connected to LTE 69 per cent of the time, compared to 66 per cent of customers using Telus' main service. Telus was tied with BCE Inc.'s Bell service. Saskatchewan Telecommunications Holding Corp., whose users were connected to LTE 42 per cent of the time, ranked last among the six Canadian services included in the measurements. OpenSignal said statistics about specific carriers were not included in the report if sufficient data on them were not available, though all were factored into each country's overall numbers. Canada ranked 14th for the speed of its LTE networks, with an average rate of 18 Mbps, which tied it with Finland, Taiwan and Slovakia. New Zealand topped the speed ranking at 36 Mbps, followed by Singapore at 33 Mbps and Romania at 30 Mbps. Germany, the U.K and China were among a cluster of countries tied for 36th place with an average speed of 13 Mbps. The U.S. was tied for 52nd with several countries at 10 Mbps. The report said that "some of the earliest adopters of LTE," including the U.S. and Germany, "are starting to fall behind in terms of data performance. In part, these older networks are suffering from their own success. In the U.S., for instance, LTE’s introduction in 2010 resulted in a huge base of LTE subscribers in the country today. Those subscribers are all competing for the same network resources, slowing down average speeds." Gill said countries with the highest speeds tend to be relative newcomers to LTE, where a lack of adoption puts less strain on networks in comparison to countries where LTE has been around for a while. OpenSignal's report notes that Canada got its first LTE service in July 2011 from Rogers. The measurements showed Videotron had the fastest LTE network in Canada with an average speed of 21 Mbps. Telus, Koodo, Bell and Rogers all had average speeds of 18 Mbps, according to the report, while SaskTel was at 17 Mbps. OpenSignal found that the global average speed of LTE connections was 12.6 Mbps, more than twice the average WiFi speed of 5 Mbps. OpenSignal said this does not necessarily indicate that "LTE is a superior technology" to WiFi, but rather that it reflects the "tremendous variance" in WiFi quality between and within countries. For example, it said North American users might attain WiFi speeds of as much as 50 Mbps or more in their homes and offices, while finding much inferior WiFi quality at public access points such as coffee shops. The average 3G connection was 3.2 Mbps, the report said. Gill said a key finding of OpenSignal's research is that it shows the majority of mobile-device users around the world are still not on LTE. "Although operators like to talk about 5G and make noise about that, I think 4G is still a technology in its infancy," he said. — With reporting by Derek Abma at dabma@thewirereport.ca and editing by Anja Karadeglija at akarad@thewirereport.ca

Canada’s LTE coverage ranked 21st globally

News | September 22, 2015

Unlock all the Canadian telecom, broadcasting and digital media news you need.

FREE TRIAL

SUBSCRIBE

Inside The Wire Report

Information

Hill Times Publishing

Get in Touch With Us

Canada’s LTE coverage ranked 21st globally

News | September 22, 2015

Unlock all the Canadian telecom, broadcasting and digital media news you need.

FREE TRIAL

SUBSCRIBE

Related Stories

Redline partners with Utah-based mining company

Videotron choses Samsung as partner for 5G

Bell opts out of 600 MHz, Rogers nabs 52 licenses for $1.7B

Freedom says ads intended to ‘stir the market,’ induce churn

Reuse & Permissions

Inside The Wire Report

Information

Hill Times Publishing

Get in Touch With Us