The OpenSignal report records Vodacom’s download speed at 24.98Mbps, beating MTN which reached 22.1Mbps – but MTN came top in terms of national coverage.
CellC and Telkom South Africa were in third and fourth places respectively, said the report, State of Mobile Network South Africa, published by the mobile analytics company today.
“The leader increased its LTE download speed by over 3Mbps in our measurements, while its rivals’ speeds have stayed fairly stagnant over the past six months,” said OpenSignal analyst Peter Boyland.
“But it was MTN that topped our coveted national 4G availability metric, extending its lead to six percentage points ahead of key rival Vodacom,” he added. “But there were just 12 percentage points separating all four operators, as our LTE availability scores were much closer than those in speed.”
Vodacom also dominated the survey in South Africa’s biggest cities, scoring highly in all six speed metrics and scoring a clean sweep in 4G latency. “MTN won the 4G availability award in two cities but was held to a surprise draw by Cell C in Cape Town,” said Boyland.
Vodacom won the 4G latency category, after drawing with MTN in OpenSignal’s last report. Vodacom passed the 30ms threshold for the first time in the company’s measurements, with a 4G latency score a full 4ms quicker than its closest rival MTN.
Vodacom also scored a clean sweep in the 4G latency metric in South Africa’s three biggest cities, with what Boyland called “an impressive 24ms in Joburg”, while the operator also trimmed over 12ms off its 3G score.
