Mobile Brodband Speed Report

OFCOM has published it’s first report into the performance of mobile broadband in the UK.    The report says that 17 per cent of UK households are using mobile broadband,  with 7 per cent who say it is there only means of internet access, compared to 3 per cent in 2009.

The research they did involved over 4.2 million tests and measured average speeds as well as the performance of the five mobile operators in areas of good 3G network coverage.  The research found some differences between the performance of operators’ 3G networks. O2, Vodafone and 3 offered faster average download speeds than T-Mobile and Orange.  O2, on average, delivered web pages faster than the other four operators and had lower average latency than 3, Orange and Vodafone. Latency is a measure of the responsiveness of a connection (it is measured by the time it takes a single packet of data to travel from a user’s PC to a third-party server and back again).

OFCOM went on to say that the most important factor affecting mobile broadband performance is coverage, and consumers should check with their provider how good the coverage is likely to be before buying a service

Note – Mobile broadband is those who access via a mobile phone or a 3G dongle or AirCard.