UK lagging behind Europe and US for 4G access
According to a survey conducted by mobile data platform Ogury, 4G use in the UK still trails that of Europe and the US. The company stated that this raises questions about whether the UK should improve its 4G capability before heavily investing in next-generation 5G service.
The survey found that on average, mobile users in the UK connect to the Internet via 4G only 18% of the time, placing the country last in 4G usage behind the US (46%), France (30%), Spain (20%) and Italy (20%). The study showed that the UK’s reliance on Wi-Fi is the highest compared to all other countries.
Ogury used proprietary data collected directly from mobile devices to construct over 300 million profiles of mobile behaviour from 120 countries. For the UK, the company based its results on data that it collected from over one million profiles.
Ogury’s findings differ from those reported recently by the National Infrastructure Commission, which stated that an average mobile user in the UK can access 4G about 53% of the time. The company maintains that, in fact, mobile users only connect via 4G 18.18% of the time and use Wi-Fi to browse 71.01% of the time.
Based on the results of the survey, Ogury questions the UKs readiness to implement 5G service. Christophe Bize, Vice President of Data and Mobile Analytics at the company, commented: “UK mobile users currently rely on Wi-Fi for the vast majority of their connections. Whether this is because of poor 4G availability, personal preference or even cost, it does not bode well for 5G.”
Ogury’s report comes on the heels of a National Infrastructure Commission study, which ranked the UK’s 4G network in 54th place behind Panama, Romania, Peru and Albania.