T-Mobile and Verizon continue to go to war with each other in the fight to be the best carrier with the most customers, better plan and price offerings. But while price is important, what customers really want is fast Internet and 4G download speeds.
After releasing a report that found that T-Mobile is faster than Verizon nationally, OpenSignal decided to dig deeper to further compare to two carriers—this time by region.
The new OpenSignal report found that Verizon hands down is the clear winner when it comes to being the leader in 4G availability. Across the U.S., Verizon's 4G LTE is the most available in every region of the U.S., with the company providing its LTE signal more often than any other operator.
It is in the Midwest that users were able to latch onto Verizon's LTE signal 87 percent of the time, whereas T-Mobile dominates in the Northeast with 87 percent availability.
Sprint ranked the lowest in the LTE availability tests in every single region of the U.S.
However, when it comes to speed, Verizon and T-Mobile are tied as the top dogs in this category. The clear winner depends on where in the U.S. customers are located.
In this report, OpenSignal used its data from its recently released semiannual State of Mobile Networks report and then broke down the data geographically to identify operator performance in the fourth quarter by broader region.
The company spilt the U.S. into five zones: the Northeast, Southeast, Midwest, Southwest, and West.
According to the report, T-Mobile placed second in the 4G availability category across all four regions. But it is winner when it comes to the fastest 4G speed in the Northeast and the Southeast.
Verizon on the other hand, is the winner of 4G speed in the West and the Midwest. Both Verizon and T-Mobile are tied in the 4G speed category in the Southwest.
While it is a statistically tie between the two carriers, there is a difference in speed performance. Verizon maintained 20 Mbps LTE download speeds in the Midwest, which is 3 Mbps higher than the national average.
T-Mobile, in comparison, averaged about 18 Mbps in the majority of the regions. Both speeds are pretty impressive.
The report didn't exclude the other top carriers, AT&T and Sprint. It found that AT&T had the best speeds in the Northeast, whereas Sprint had the best performance in Midwest.
AT&T also scored high (84.4 percent) in 4G availability in the Southwest. This should come to no surprise since that is where its headquarters is based.
In the battle of T-Mobile vs. Verizon, this new report further proves that the competition is stiff.
