T-Mobile Named Fastest US Mobile Carrier by New Wirefly Report (phonedog.com)

T-Mobile offered the fastest internet speed to subscribers between Q1 and Q2 of 2017 (which ended in June), according to the Wirefly Speed Test, which combed through thousands of test results made using its service. T-Mobile scored highest in overall speed while Verizon ended up with a close second spot, Wirefly, which doesn't require Java or Flash for its tests, added. AT&T and Sprint rounded out the ranking at third and fourth, respectively, the report added, which was done in collaboration with SourceForge. T-Mobile also topped the chart for offering the fastest mobile download speed. An anonymous user writes: T-Mobile offered 22.18 Mbps download speed, while Verizon Wireless ended up with another close second with 21.45 Mbps download. AT&T came in with an average download speed of 17.00 Mbps, and Sprint was trailing all with 15.76 Mbps. Verizon finished with the fastest average upload speed at 16.06 Mbps. You can read the full report here.

Comments

Re:They are all fast enough for me

[Anonymous Coward]

Cheap prepaid services like Cricket and Virgin are fine in urban areas but they don't offer any roaming at all. When I drove from Tacoma to Detroit with Virgin I went days without service.

Cricket IS AT&T only prepaid and throttled max speed. Cricket will work anywhere that AT&T will.

Re:Fast means nothing

[Tailhook]

Firmware changes won't do it. The phone needs the right RF filters to function on these the expanded LTE bands. Just because you can get LTE firmware doesn't mean you'll get the benefit of newer frequencies. For instance, Band 66 is wider than Band 4, so you need a transceiver with filters adapted to the expanded band. Band 12 is a relatively low frequency, which provides long range, but is far out of band for the filters in older devices. Another issue is VoLTE support (voice over LTE); it's not available on every device yet whether it's physically possible or not; Nexus 4 can't do it no matter what firmware you load.

The Moto g5 plus is certified by T-mobile to function on all of their bands and support VoLTE as well. That makes it a good budget phone choice if you're on T-mobile.

T-mobile doesn't have the capital to compete with Verizon et al. on the traditional frequencies so they've invested in newer frequency bands as the FCC has auctioned them. You need to pay close attention to your phone's capabilities if you care about coverage and performance with T-mobile. Even flagship phones available today can't get the full benefits; you have to investigate the device.