Deutsche Telekom continues to operate the best performing mobile network in Germany, Chip magazine's Network Test 2017 found. The test compared the network coverage and quality of the mobile networks of Telekom, Vodafone and O2 and was based on nearly 470,000 measurement samples from 27,000 phone calls and 180,000 data samples made at various locations across Germany.
Chip found that Telekom had the best network overall, awarding it a total score of 91.3 points and a mark of "very good", the first time a network received this label in Chip's survey. Vodafone came in second with a total score of 88.0 points, while O2 was again far behind its competitors with an overall score of 66.7.
Testers compared network coverage in 35 cities across Germany, including in highly frequented urban hotspots such as airports, railway stations and shopping centres, as well as on busy driving routes and in Germany's high-speed ICE trains.
The test found that the quality of all three mobile networks improved markedly from 2016 thanks to technological upgrades the operators have made to their networks, like Telekom and Vodafone's introduction of Enhanced Voice Systems (EVS), and the strong sense of competition prevailing among the operators.
While all three networks saw their scores improve from last year, Chip said much from its rankings otherwise remained the same, with Telekom coming in first place overall shortly ahead of Vodafone and O2 coming in third place in every category, partly as a result of its focus on the ongoing consolidation of its network with that of E-Plus.Overall, Telekom came in first place in nine of the survey's ten categories. Chip found that Telekom had the best performing LTE network, which received 93.1 points compared to Vodafone’s 89.8 points and O2’s 74.2 points.
Telekom's also had the top score for mobile internet and telephony performance, with 90.5 and 92.9 points, respectively. Telekom's mobile network also performed the best in the measurements taken in five of Germany’s largest cities (Berlin, Duesseldorf, Hamburg, Munich and Stuttgart).
Vodafone's network outperformed Telekom's in supporting calls and mobile internet on long-distance trains, the only category where it outranked its Bonn-based rival. Chip awarded Vodafone a total of 65.6 points here, ahead of Telekom with 62.1 points and O2 with 34.6 points.
