Slow 4g download and upload in London

[seandunderdale]

Hi all.

Ive been trying to use my o2 Mate 20pro for hotspot uploading of large files. I ran speed test today as I was stuggling with slow transfers. It turns out my download is 30mb and upload is 1.6mb....

I ran the same test on my girlfriends Vodafone Samsung, in the same location, and she got 200mb download and 50mb upload.

Has anyone else had slow 4d speeds with o2? Is it my handset? Im really baffled here. Why would one carrier be orders of magnitude faster than another? Or why would a handset be so much faster? Either way, Im changing one of them!

[Bambino]

@seandunderdale Could just be O2 network congestion or possibly a mast problem. You can check with the links below.

https://status.o2.co.uk/

https://www.o2.co.uk/apps/my-network

[jonsie]

Those speeds are normal for O2 where you are @seandunderdale 

[seandunderdale]

Hi Bambino, thanks for the reply. 

Ive run these tests alot for the last 3 weeks. I consistently get less than 30mb download and less than 2mb upload, whereas my girlfriend on Vodafone consistently gets 10x both of those speeds, or more.

We live near London Bridge, so fairly well connected signal wise. Our home internet (talk talk) is awful too, so for uploading my large (1-2GB) work files, Ive had to commandeer my girlfriends vodafone phone to setup a hotspot. Like I said, this has been this way for weeks. 

Id accept some fluctuation here and there, but the consistent difference is staggering. 

The status and mynetwork apps backup the slow connection. I just ran the speedtest on MyNetwork and it was 18.6down. 1.6up and it says there is good coverage. 

Could you let me know if there are any cases of o2 having 200mb down and 50mb upload in London or the uk? Is it just that Vodafone covers my area better?

[seandunderdale]

Hi Jonsie,

Thanks for the response. Its good to narrow it down then. Ill have to wrap up my contract I think then as those kinds of speeds just arent good enough. 

I will probably grab a ThreeNetwork Huawei B535 4g home router as a temporary fix, but long term I think I need a personal data plan with a bit more speed.

[Bambino]

@seandunderdale Have you tried your girlfriend's sim in your phone? O2 and Vodafone share masts, so you might want to explore that.

[seandunderdale]

I havnt tried that yet but my Three 4g wifi connection shows up today, so Ill post the speed test result of that later.

[seandunderdale]

Installed the Three 4g wifi and right off the bat got 50mb down and 30mb up. Thats not as fast as my girlfriends Vodafone, but its plenty fast to be able to work from home now. 

Ill still try swithcing the sims over, just out of curiosity.

[jonsie]

London has always been a problem on O2 and it's ridiculous considering it's the second capital of the UK.