The latest OpenSignal report on LTE 4G speed in India explains reasons why Reliance Jio’s customers are facing an overloaded network. Network congestion creates a bottleneck that slows down Jio connections much more than the connections of other telecom operators.
Reliance Jio’s 125 million customers are facing a poor 4G network because the nation-wide 4G operator has grabbed several million 4G subscribers during the promotion offer, offering huge amount of free data.
The 4G speed test rated Airtel, Idea Cellular, Reliance Jio and Vodafone India as the top Indian telecom service providers for average 4G speeds from December 1 to February 28.
OpenSignal said it’s experimenting with a new metric called average peak speed, and India is the first country to see the result.
“Average peak speed accounts for the fastest speed tests. It’s designed to measure the optimized 4G experience consumers see when the network is performing at its full capacity, as opposed to the typical everyday experience which is often limited by network congestion and other technical factors,” OpenSignal said.
Peak speeds for 4G networks of Airtel, Idea and Vodafone are four to five times faster than their everyday speeds. Jio’s peak average peak speed of 50 Mbps is 13 times faster than its average download speed of 3.9 Mbps.
“Reliance Jio’s network is technically capable of delivering far faster speeds than Jio’s customers actually receive,” OpenSignal said.
Reliance Jio has invested more than $20 billion for providing 4G network services across the country. Jio will expand its 4G coverage to rural areas with the recently announced VoLTE phone JioPhone.
Airtel won OpenSignal’s fastest 4G speed award. OpenSignal measured faster optimized speeds on Airtel’s networks than on the other three. Airtel’s average peak speed test was 56.6 Mbps, which is 5 times faster than its average 4G download test of 11.5 Mbps.
Jio has the slowest 4G speed
Jio had the slowest average 4G speeds. But in peak speed comparison Jio’s average connection was second only to Airtel. Jio’s average peak speed at 50 Mbps, which is nearly 13 times faster than its everyday 4G speed download speed of 3.9 Mbps. Both Vodafone India and Idea Cellular peak speed measurements are about 4 times faster than their 4G measurements.
Suggestions for Jio
Jio’s networks are capable of supporting some incredibly fast LTE connections when conditions are ideal. Jio has experienced phenomenal growth since launching its all-4G service last autumn, signing up more than 100 million subscribers in the space of few months.
OpenSignal says Reliance Jio can improve the speed by adding new spectrum and more cell sites. The 4G speed can also improve if Jio consumers reduce mobile data usage on the 4G network.
“Jio’s slow average 4G speeds aren’t a technical limitation, but rather a capacity hurdle. As Jio adds more capacity — either through new spectrum or building more cell sites — or as Jio’s mobile data consumption levels drop, then its typical download speeds should increase,” OpenSignal said.
Reasons for difference between TRAI and OpenSignal reports
Indian telecom regulator TRAI has measured the fastest 4G speeds on Jio’s networks for the past six months through its MySpeed app. Ookla has found Jio’s average LTE speeds to be much slower. The discrepancy comes from TRAI’s methodology. TRAI is measuring operator performance under ideal conditions, while OpenSignal’s methodology tests the typical everyday experience of consumers.
Baburajan K
