Three has found to be the most reliable mobile network for London’s commuters, and O2 the worst, in a study by GWS.
The researchers examined the mobile networks across the ten busiest commuters lines into the capital and found that all mobile networks struggled with handling the volume of voice and data traffic on their networks, with a third of mobile browser sessions and one in seven voice calls made on commuter trains failing.
Overall, 23 percent of 3G data packets and 37 percent of 4G data packets travelling across mobile data networks on the lines failed to be delivered.
Three does not have old 2G infrastructure to rely upon when the network is busy, but was found to have the most reliable voice network. All the other networks fell back to their creaky old 2G networks a fair amount – O2 60% of the time, EE 42% of the time, and Vodafone 40% of the time.
Despite their reliance on 2G infrastructure two fifths of the time, Vodafone was found to be the most reliable 3G data network and EE was the most reliable for 4G data.
Critically, none of the networks actually performed well in the tests, with data deadspots and dropped calls plaguing each of them across a variety of routes, and even in major stations such as St Pancras, Waterloo, Euston, and Liverpool Street.
GWS has produced a map showing all the data with options to filter it by network, voice, 3G and 4G.
Photograph by DeclanTM