WHAT SPEED DO MOBILE USERS REALLY GET? - P3 DATA SPEED REPORT ABOUT DATA SPEED COMPARISON IN THE US MARKETS - P3 Group

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WHAT SPEED DO MOBILE USERS REALLY GET? - P3 DATA SPEED REPORT ABOUT DATA SPEED COMPARISON IN THE US MARKETS - P3 Group
WHAT SPEED DO MOBILE
USERS REALLY GET?
P3 DATA SPEED REPORT ABOUT DATA SPEED COMPARISON
IN THE US MARKETS
The US mobile networks are fast. At      general speed capability of the mo-        looks at the downlink speed as per-
least, that’s what we hear every day.    bile network, to the tariff used plus      ceived by the users in our panel in the
But does this reflect the actual user    many other effects.                        different urban areas, defined by the
experience? Not always.                  We aim to bring more transparen-           U.S. Office of Management and Bud-
In order to understand why the user’s    cy into the discussion about speed.        get as so-called Metropolitan Statisti-
experience sometimes differs from        Therefore, we have compared the            cal Areas (MSA).
the carriers’ advertisements, we have    speed of the cellular networks in the
made a thorough analysis examining       United States in a new and differenti-     THE REPORT PROVIDES TWO
the actual speed of data transmissions   ated way: We look at the actual speed      DIFFERENT VIEWS ON SPEED.
while consumers use their smart-         of data transmissions while consumers      First, we look at the top speeds ob-
phones in real life.                     use their favorite apps and services.      served at the fastest locations by the
Looking at what is happening in          This is significantly different to so-     fastest users within an urban area.
reality is very important. How long      called legacy or traditional speed         We call this: Network Top Speed.
does it take to drive from home to       tests. Those tests are usually based       Here only the fastest samples con-
work very much depends on both           on artificially initiated data transfers   tribute to the results, thus reflecting
road and traffic conditions as well      – thus, they less represent real life      which speed users can get regardless
as on the hour of commuting. Ask-        conditions.                                of any possible limitations.
ing how fast is your mobile net-         We have examined and compared the          Second, we look at the User Speed
work, will probably lead to the          big four mobile network carriers: Ve-      Experience where we analyze the
same answer: It depends. Here, the       rizon, AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint – the     average speed results as well as the
speed experience is related to the       results are presented in this report. It   fastest samples of all users.

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WHAT SPEED DO MOBILE USERS REALLY GET? - P3 DATA SPEED REPORT ABOUT DATA SPEED COMPARISON IN THE US MARKETS - P3 Group
Who is the leading carrier with respect to
                                                                                              downlink Network Top Speed, i.e. the Network
                                                                                              Top Speed that the fastest users were able to
                                                                                              reach or exceed in the best 10% locations in every
                                                                                              metropolitan statistical areas (MSA)? Colored
                                                                                              areas indicate which carrier leads the benchmark
                                                                                              in each MSA. Grey indicates MSAs where at least
                                                                                              two networks are on par providing about the
                                                                          Alaska
                                                                                              same results for downlink speed (within a relative
                                                                                              margin of 1%).

   Verizon
   AT&T
   T-Mobile
   Sprint
                                                                          Hawaii
   On Par

                                                                                   (Mbit/s)

                                          How fast are the networks? The
                                          numbers show the downlink Net-
                                          work Top Speed that on average is                            69,1       50,0        49,9        37,9

                                          exceeded in the best 10% of each
                                          Metropolitan Statistical Area.           Network           Verizon      AT&T      T-Mobile     Sprint

NETWORK TOP SPEED
From the network’s perspective, it is important what top            The map shows the different MSAs and marks the leading
downlink speed a user can achieve when there is no limi-            carrier with respect to network top downlink speed capa-
tation on the user’s side, e.g. due to device capabilities          bilities. The top speeds achieved, averaged over all MSAs,
or tariff restrictions. This is because carriers invest a lot       are shown in the bar chart.
in frequency spectrum, network densification and in up-
grading the networks to the latest technology – like car-
rier aggregation to enable faster data transmissions. The
Network Top Speed is a result of network capabilities and
coverage, and consequently very much depends on where
you use your smartphone. The speed a network shows in                                                Verizon
one part of the city is not necessarily the same in anoth-                                      clearly leads the
er part of the city. Therefore, for benchmarking the net-
works we look at the fastest speed achieved by any user at                                      Network Top Speed
a measurement location and then do a statistical analysis                                       benchmark
of all measurement locations in a Metropolitan Statistical
Area (MSA) with 472,760,281 samples.

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WHAT SPEED DO MOBILE USERS REALLY GET? - P3 DATA SPEED REPORT ABOUT DATA SPEED COMPARISON IN THE US MARKETS - P3 Group
Looking at both, the number of MSAs         While Verizon leads in metro areas all
where a carrier delivers higher top         over the country, T-Mobile leads in its
speeds than the competition and also        headquarters’ neighborhood in Belle-
at the top speed effectively measured       vue, WA and is especially strong in
– Verizon clearly leads the Network         Florida with remarkably high Net-
Top Speed benchmark. With an aver-          work Top Speeds, outperforming the
age Network Top Speed of about 69           competition by far.
Mbit/s, Verizon outperforms the oth-        However, the diversity of Network
er carriers in 294 metropolitan areas       Top Speeds amongst the different
by far. T-Mobile still leads in 47 of the   metro areas is smallest for Verizon
metro areas, AT&T wins the bench-           which means that Verizon shows the
mark in only 31 MSAs, though being          most consistent picture across all
on the same Network Top Speed level         MSAs. AT&T shows a similarly small
as T-Mobile. Sprint wins in only one        diversity across the metro areas while
metro area at a Network Top Speed           the top speeds observed for T-Mobile
level of about 38 Mbit/s lagging be-        and Sprint vary much more from one
hind the other carriers.                    MSA to another.

    Verizon provides the most
consistent Network Top Speeds
across the country.

                           T-Mobile stands out with
                      high speeds in Florida.

    NETWORK TOP SPEED
    From the countless millions of downlink speed samples observed while
    consumers use their smartphone in everyday life, the fastest samples in-
    dicate what the speed networks can deliver regardless of any limitations,
    e.g. by tariff or smartphone capabilities. Of course, depending on network
    properties like coverage or available spectrum, the achievable speed var-
    ies amongst different locations in a market. We take that into consideration
    by segmenting each MSA into a regular grid and identify the fastest speed
    sample observed in each grid zone of about 1.5x1.5 miles. The fastest 10%
    of all grid zones in each MSA determine the Network Top Speed that we
    use for comparing the different networks in the metro areas.

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WHAT SPEED DO MOBILE USERS REALLY GET? - P3 DATA SPEED REPORT ABOUT DATA SPEED COMPARISON IN THE US MARKETS - P3 Group
USER SPEED EXPERIENCE
                                                                 The user’s perspective on speed can be different from the
                                                                 network’s perspective. Though the Network Top Speeds
              Speed observed from a consumer’s perspective       and the User Speed Experience are related, they are still
              while using a smartphone. The graph shows the
                                                                 two different sides of the same coin. In real life, users face
              user experienced speeds averaged over all users
              and Metropolitan Statistical Areas (top) and the   quite a few limitations that typically make their achieved
              speed of the best 10% of the experienced speeds.   speed by far lower than the top throughput the network
                                                                 can pro­vide. Sharing the network capacity with other users,
                                                                 traffic shaping by the carrier, bad local coverage conditions,
Average
                                                                 tariff limitations and not least the type of application used
(Mbit/s)                                                         – all these factors may determine which speed consumers
                                                                 really face when using their smartphones.
                                                                 So, the speed achieved from a user’s perspective typical-
                 5,3        4,3         4,6         5,2
                                                                 ly amount about one tenth of the Network Top Speed.
                                                                 Again, Verizon leads the benchmark with an average user
Network        Verizon     AT&T      T-Mobile     Sprint
                                                                 speed of 5.3 Mbit/s. Sprint shows only slightly lower user
                                                                 speeds with an average of 5.2 Mbit/s. This is remarkable
                                                                 since Sprint’s Network Top Speed was only a little more
                                                                 than half of what the Verizon network showed. Obvious-
Fastest 10%                                                      ly, consumers on Sprint face less limitations in their real
(Mbit/s)
                                                                 life smartphone usage than users in the other networks.
                                                                 The average user speed with T-Mobile is 4.6 Mbit/s, while
                                                                 AT&T is slowest with still competitive 4.3 Mbit/s.
                                                                 In addition to benchmarking the networks with respect
                                                                 to the average of the experienced speed, it is also worth
                                                                 looking at the diversity of the speed, i.e. at how consis-
                                                                 tently the throughput experience is achieved. A good
                                                                 indica­tion for the variation is the relation between the av-
                                                                 erage and the fastest 10% of the observed speeds. Sprint
                13,5        10,9       12,2        13,7
                                                                 and T-Mobile show little higher variation than the compe-
                                                                 tition and achieve a “fastest-10%” level of 13.7 Mbit/s and
Network        Verizon     AT&T      T-Mobile     Sprint
                                                                 12.2 Mbit/s, respectively.

                                                                      Obviously, consumers
                                                                 on Sprint face less limitations
                                                                 in their real life smartphone
                                                                 usage than users in the other
                                                                 networks.

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WHAT SPEED DO MOBILE USERS REALLY GET? - P3 DATA SPEED REPORT ABOUT DATA SPEED COMPARISON IN THE US MARKETS - P3 Group
With both T-Mobile and AT&T showing distinctly lower val-     differences in network area coverage are deliberately
ues than the other networks, the User Speed Experience        ignored to show a like-for-like comparison focusing on
benchmark remains between Verizon and Sprint. Howev-          speed only. For a detailed analysis about network cover-
er, even though the user speed values show Verizon and        age – see P3 Connectivity on Interstate Report (www.p3-
Sprint head-to-head, Verizon users still have a more con-     group.com/en/p3-interstate-comparison-US-2018) and
sistent speed experience, both regarding peak-to-average      P3 State Connectivity Report (www.p3-group.com/en/
and regarding the different Metropolitan Statistical Areas.   US-State-Connectivity).
Finally, without understating Sprint’s pursuit, it is worth
mentioning that the benchmark shown here is based on the
common footprint of all four networks, i.e. on the area
within the MSAs where consumers from all four carriers
have transferred data with their smartphone. Potential

    USER SPEED EXPERIENCE
    When comparing the networks from the user’s perspective, we take into consideration that the speed a user
    achieves while using the smartphone depends on the consumer’s usage profile, i.e. the apps used, the locations
    where the phone is used and, to some extent, also on the tariff. Therefore, each consumer has an own speed expe-
    rience depending on the usage profile. For comparing the networks, we analyze the User Speed Experience of each
    of the 2.3 million users in our crowd panel and then look at the average and top speed throughout of these users.
    In the hundreds of millions of downlink speed samples, we first identify the smartphone data traffic that creates a
    distinguishable speed experience. This step is important as most app generated data traffic, e.g. a WhatsApp chat,
    is not representing the user experience of network speed simply because the bandwidth demand of a chat session
    is far from what modern networks can deliver even under bad conditions.
    For the calculation of the User Speed Experience we also segment each MSA into a regular grid and identify the
    speed achieved by each user in each of the grid zones visited. This way, we take the location-dependent nature of
    the speed into account. For each user, we consider the different locations as equally important for the experienced
    speed and therefore do the network benchmark based on all these speed samples from all users in the respective
    Metropolitan Statistical Area. We look at the common footprint of the four networks, i.e. the area within the MSAs
    where consumers of all four carriers have used their smartphone. Here, we look at the average of all speed samples
    and the 10% fastest samples representing the user experienced top speeds.

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WHAT SPEED DO MOBILE USERS REALLY GET? - P3 DATA SPEED REPORT ABOUT DATA SPEED COMPARISON IN THE US MARKETS - P3 Group
METHODOLOGY
WITH MORE THAN 15 YEARS OF EXPERIENCE IN BENCHMARKING MOBILE NETWORKS ALL OVER THE WORLD,
P3 AGGREGATES DATA INTO MEANINGFUL METRICS, PROVIDING A BALANCED AND INDEPENDENT PICTURE
OF THE COMPETITIVE SITUATION ACROSS DIFFERENT MARKETS.

The P3 methodology looks at the real life data traffic speed
and thus analyses what really happens on the consumers’                            Verizon shows higher
smartphones when they use any of their apps. Compared
to old fashioned speed tests that are based on download­
                                                                              top speeds than the
ing bulks of artificial data, the analysis of real life traffic for           competition in more than
doing a meaningful speed benchmark is much harder, but
it is worth it. A proper cleansing and smart aggregation
                                                                              75% of the metro areas.
of the collected data allows a nuanced view on different
facets of speed.
The P3 solution is integrated into 800+ very diverse Android          rience databases in the world, adding billions of measure-
apps and passively collects data in the background. If one            ments every month. The data set is the most realistic and
of the applications is installed on the end-user’s phone,             diverse that is currently available in the market in terms
the data collection takes place continuously – 24/7/365               of locations, geography, devices, subscriptions, networks,
– on this device. Other data solutions from other sourc-              technologies and smartphone usage patterns. And, just
es have a very technical user base or they measure speed              like in blockchain, P3 has designed their technology with a
with artificial data traffic not representing real life condi-        complex security layer that makes it impossible to manipu­
tions. Thus, their results are typically skewed towards high-         late the data.
end and high-volume data users. With the integration into             P3 applies advanced data analytics to find the relevant in-
diverse apps covering different market segments, the data­            formation from the bulk data, transferring it to the P3 Big
set used is much more representative and tamper-proof                 Data Platform. Automated aggregation with P3 developed
than data from classical speed test apps. The unique user             software provides us flexibility and control. P3 has gained
base and dataset allows P3 to collect data about the real-            extensive experience in collecting, storing and analyzing
world customer experience – wherever and whenever                     large data sets. P3 can provide information for the optimi-
customers use their phones.                                           zation of networks and show whether networks live up to
                                                                      consumers’ expectations. P3 data scientists can drill down
HARDENED TO PREVENT MANIPULATION                                      into large data sets and analyze them on a global scale.
In the US, about 2.3 million consumers contribute to P3’s             The information gathered and processed by P3 can be pur-
dataset. This equals about one out of every 140 inhabitants           chased by interested parties in an anonymized format. This
in the United States. This is one of the biggest mobile expe-         can provide valuable insights for network improvements.

                                                                                                                               6
WHAT SPEED DO MOBILE USERS REALLY GET? - P3 DATA SPEED REPORT ABOUT DATA SPEED COMPARISON IN THE US MARKETS - P3 Group
P3 CROWD FACTS USA

    472,760,281         41.3 BILLION
    SPEED SAMPLES       TOTAL SAMPLES

    383                 3 MONTHS,
    METROPOLITAN        MAY TO JULY 2018
    STATISTICAL AREAS
                        DATA COLLECTION
                        TIME PERIOD
    2,195,628
    USERS

7                                          7
SNAPSHOT: OUR DATA
     COLLECTION CAPABILITY

    DATA COLLECTION DURING
    THE BURNING MAN FESTIVAL
    Once a year, 70,000 people gather for one week in
    Nevada’s Black Rock Desert to create Black Rock City,
    a temporary metropolis, to celebrate Burning Man
    which took place August 26 – September 3, 2018. The
    map shows the data points collected by P3 in that
    area for the 2018 event. It resembles the iconic shape
    of the city and shows what massive amount of data can
    be collected with a passive crowdsourced solution.

CONTACT
Hakan Ekmen                              P3 communications GmbH
CEO, P3 communications GmbH              Am Kraftversorgungsturm 3 │ 52070 Aachen │ Germany
hakan.ekmen@p3-group.com                 www.p3-group.com │ info@p3-group.com
+49 151 571 33 235                       +49 241 9437400

Find more reports on www.p3-networkanalytics.com.

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