Spain has fastest average LTE speeds globally – report

Spain has the fastest LTE networks in the world, with average download speeds of 18Mb/s, according to a study by wireless network tracking service OpenSignal.

Denmark, Finland and South Korea tied for second place with speeds of 17Mb/s. The US, with average speeds of just 7Mb/s, ranked 26th out of the 29 countries measured.

The rankings were determined by measuring data speeds and LTE access between last November and January for the 11 million users who have downloaded OpenSignal’s app and subscribed to an LTE mobile data plan.

Spain’s Vodafone ES had the fastest LTE network, with speeds of 25.2Mb/s, but its coverage is fairly limited. 3 UK recorded the slowest LTE speeds of all the networks measured.

Last year’s fastest country, Australia, fell to 14th as the average speeds of the country’s networks were 12-15Mb/s. T-Mobile had the fastest LTE network in the US.

The report also found that the average global LTE speed is 9.3Mb/s, almost 4 times faster than the average 3G speed. But no nation averages speeds faster than 18Mb/s.

South Korea came out on top when looking at the accessibility of LTE networks. OpenSignal’s ‘Time on LTE’ metric measures the proportion of time a user has access to an LTE network. The country was number one with 95 per cent accessibility. All three of the country’s networks topped the global ranking. LG Uplus topped the list, with its users able to access LTE 99 per cent of the time.

The US was 6th with 77 per cent accessibility. Verizon was on top in the market, with its 4G users having access to the network 86 per cent of the time.