Jio has been judged to be the fastest in broadband speeds in India, raking in the highest ratings in the last quarter of 2020, according to Ookla.
Ookla is the authority on testing internet speeds, data rate and latency.
In the same quarter Vodafone leads in terms of fastest mobile data downloads, edging out Airtel from Q3.
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Fixed Broadband Speeds
Jio was rated 3.7 on its mean download speed, making it the fastest and the only one with a positive NPS (Net Promoter Score) — a customer satisfaction metric which indicates whether a customer would recommend the particular service provider or not.
Jio Fiber has mean download speed of 80mbps while ACT Fibernet has 75mbps.
ACT Fibernet came in second, followed by Airtel Xstream Fiber and Excitel.
ACT Fibernet and Excitel both shared the same star rating while the former had a higher NPS.
BSNL lagged behind, having the slowest average download speed over broadband, despite Hathway getting the lowest rating and NPS score.
Mobile Internet Speed (all figures from Q4 2020)
Vi (Vodafone-Idea) is at the forefront with respect to mean mobile download speeds which is over 15mbps.
Airtel came in 2nd with 14mbps and Jio came in 3rd with 10mbps. None of the top three providers had a positive NPS score.
India’s Status in SAARC
India leads South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) in having the fastest broadband connectivity and mean download speeds. This can be attributed to widespread fiber line deployment.
However India doesn’t fare too well in mobile speeds, being the 3rd slowest nation.
Maldives turned out to be the only one in the bloc with active 5G and hence topped the list in terms of mobile speeds.
Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Bhutan ranked 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th respectively.
Afghanistan came in last with the slowest mobile data speeds in the SAARC bloc.
5G in India
Airtel, in partnership with Qualcomm, will be rolling out 5G in india, having already conducted test runs in Hyderabad.
Also likely to join the fray will be Jio partnering with Samsung, Nokia joining hands with Airtel and Vi (Voda-Idea) going with Ericsson.
We will have more knowledge of where things stand once Spectrum Auction commences in October.
Excitement over 5G is understandable as one can expect dazzling speeds (up to 10x faster than 4G) and low latency. Think seconds to download GB-size files, and 4K definition streaming without delay.
However reality could pose as an obstacle in the way of fully realising 5G as inadequate wireless spectrum could affect the promised speeds and low latency.
Airtel All Set To Roll Out 5G In India In Partnership With Qualcomm, learn more.