That’s how far GSM services have become, they can now easily beat Wi-Fi. However, it still has a way to go in terms of up speeds.
A new report from OpenSignal showed that 5G has defeated Wi-Fi in terms of download speeds, which is what users normally use when they browse the internet. However, Wi-Fi still is slightly faster in terms of upload speed, which is what users use to post things such as images and videos onto social media sites, as well as streaming content.
The analysis by OpenSignal applies to smartphone users that discovered that connecting to 5G is a lot faster than using Wi-Fi to browse. The above chart shows that 5G is 5.3x faster than Wi-Fi and 8.8x faster than 4G, which is a huge feat since the purpose of 5G development is to drastically improve of what’s available with 4G, and it really shows a huge difference. This is from data collected from 1st of March until 29th May.
In terms of download speeds, 5G clocked at an average 138.6Mbps, which is 122.8Mbps faster than 4G and 112.3Mbps faster than Wi-Fi, that’s breathtakingly and obviously fast with a very wide gap.
However, in terms of upload speeds, Wi-Fi is the clear winner but lest not forget that 5G is significantly faster than 4G even on upload. Wi-Fi clocked at 14.4Mbps average while 5G clocked at 12.8Mbps average. 4G looks very slow in comparison, clocking only at 4.1Mbps.
OpenSignal even reported that using 5G is definitely a much better choice when playing competitive games. Due to the chart above, using 5G services means less latency (in theory) therefore lesser lagging. However, of course, this depends on how close are you to a cell tower as well as how tight internet traffic is around the area as well as how strong its bandwidth is. In theory, 5G is 3Mbps faster than Wi-Fi on average.
The same goes for streaming where 5G is again the winner. That’s a 3-1 score! OpenSignal showed that smartphone users benefit more when using 5G to watch movies and play video than using regular Wi-Fi. It’s not a small boost too, that’s 68.6Mbps average vs 47.7Mbps, a gap of 20.9Mbps!
This goes to show that cellular services is now a lot more dependable than Wi-Fi. Although there are also now significant Wi-Fi improvements such as the development of Wi-Fi 7 and the normalization of Wi-Fi 6/6E connections, the fact that cellular networks can now compete toe-to-toe with Wi-Fi is a huge milestone. That has never been possible before and cellular networks have been stigmatized to be slower than Wi-Fi.
“This new Opensignal analysis shows the arrival of 5G means that cellular connections are no longer always inferior to Wifi. In fact, average 5G download speeds are faster than Wifi and 5G currently enables the best experience in the Philippines on average when playing multiplayer mobile games or streaming video.” OpenSignal reported.
While this is the case, we should not forget that Wi-Fi will always continue to be important and relevant in our lives as it still remains as the more affordable connectivity option. “However, Wifi will continue to have an important role — especially when backing up files and downloading large apps due to the low cost of data it provides compared to many mobile plans.” They added.
Source: OpenSignal
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