Bharti Airtel has beaten rivals Vodafone Idea (Vi) and Reliance Jio when it comes to download speed, video, games and voice app experience, according to a report by UK-based network analytics firm Open Signal. Meanwhile, Jio has been accorded best 4G availability as well as the 4G coverage experience by Open Signal.
“Similarly, Jio has retained its grip on two awards, namely 4G availability and 4G Coverage Experience, while ownership of the Upload Speed Experience award has smoothly passed from Vodafone to Vi,” the report said.
Open Signal examined the mobile network experience of the four main mobile network operators in India — Airtel, BSNL, Jio and Vi over a period of 90 days starting from May 1, 2020. The firm also explored 49 of India’s largest cities and compared the user experience across these four operators.
In the first operator-level analysis of how Indian users experience mobile games over cellular networks, Airtel surpassed the others with a score of 55.6 out of 100, closely followed by Vi and then Jio.
“This measure of the mobile experience analyses how the multiplayer Games Experience is affected by mobile network conditions including latency, packet loss and jitter to determine the impact on gameplay. The higher the score, the less likely it is that our users felt that their experience was marred by cellular connectivity issues,” the report said.
Airtel also topped download speed experience with 10.4 Mbps. However, the report notes that the gap between Airtel and second-placed Vi has narrowed. Average download speeds on Vi were observed to be only 0.3 Mbps below Airtel’s at 10.1 Mbps. Jio’s download speed, according to Open Signal. was 6.9 Mbps.
Airtel also won the video experience award for the fourth time in a row and this time, it was the only operator to be placed in the Good category for this measure.
Vi, created from the merger of Vodafone and Idea, won the upload speed experience with a score of 3.5 Mbps. It beat second-placed Airtel by 0.7 Mbps. “The average upload speeds observed by our Vi users were 1.3 Mbps faster than those seen by their Jio counterparts,” the report noted.