Which Cell Service Is The Best In Nyc

New York has i of the most complex network layouts in the state. PCMag's home urban center has AT&T low-ring 5G, all 3 layers of T-Mobile 5G, and Verizon 5G as well. AT&T's network hither is fragmented over several frequency bands.

Verizon'due south 4G network really determined its win. It was significantly faster and more reliable than either of its competitors in New York, with speeds of up to 414Mbps that exceeded what I'd await from mid-ring 5G. Verizon's feat in New York is even more than impressive because it'southward getting many of those speeds on 50MHz of traditional licensed spectrum, without using whatsoever 4G-enhancing gimmicks similar CBRS or LAA (using Wi-Fi spectrum).

New York City carrier speed chart winner

Although Verizon says it has 5G scattered around New York City, we weren't impressed. We only saw it at 3.6 percent of locations and at none of our stationary locations, and because all of the Verizon 5G tests were moving, we got relatively low speeds. (High-band 5G doesn't cope well with moving.) Sometimes it was really close to our stationary locations, though. For example, we did one set of tests at 155th Street and Amsterdam Avenue in Manhattan on 4G, just there was 5G just around the corner at 153rd and Broadway, our phones discovered on the mode out.

AT&T actually found itself dragged downwardly by its 5G performance. Pure 4G speeds came in at 102Mbps down; in the 63 percent of our tests where our 5G telephone said it was getting 5G, it got a mere 41Mbps down. I've seen this happening in recent phone reviews, and I take some potential explanations. Y'all tin can't currently combine low-band 4G and 5G. AT&T is using a very narrow 5MHz channel for low-band 5G in New York, and often that replaces a broader 10MHz channel of 4G. Phones are too able to combine fewer 4G carriers when 5G is present, so if the new 5G carrier is very narrow (every bit AT&T'southward is), they actually lose operation over using multiple 4G carriers.

AT&T has some of its "5G+" millimeter-wave 5G on the Lower Due east Side, and my previous tests have shown that if you stand in just the right place, information technology'due south really fast. But I didn't go any mmWave results from AT&T in our drive testing, even with the windows down to let it into the auto. The takeaway: AT&T's 4G is considerably better than its 5G in New York right at present.

That's not the case with T-Mobile or Verizon. T-Mobile's 5G is 58 percent faster than its 4G overall in New York City, according to our results. The reason T-Mobile didn't win here is that exterior the 46 percent of locations where we got 5G, its 4G speeds were badly suffering, with much lower reliability than AT&T or Verizon. I've been hearing from many other New Yorkers about T-Mobile 4G speed and reliability problems in the city this summertime, and our results prove they're real.

The "layer block" really came through for T-Mobile, and if you lot're buying a 5G T-Mobile phone for utilize in New York, I recommend that you lot get one that has all three levels of 5G. I got terrific speeds in Alphabet Urban center where nosotros've tested 5G before, and although I'm not entirely certain, I think some of that might have been high-band.