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Which country has the fastest 4G service? Hint, the U.S. is eighth

By Alan Friedman

Published: Feb 13, 2013, 9:40 PM

Wireless service

Which country has the fastest 4G service? Hint, the U.S. is eighth

Screenshots from the OpenSignal app

In the U.K., OpenSignal is a company that uses crowdsourcing through its Android app to collect data. Thanks to this data, we can tell you that Sweden, the first country to launch LTE service, has the fastest 4G network with an average download speed of 22.1 Mbps. Right behind is Hong Kong with an average download speed of 19.6 Mbps. Denmark and Canada are third and fourth with average download speeds of 19.1 Mbps and 18.1 Mbps. What about the U.S.? With an average download speed of 9.6 Mbps, the States finished 8th.

Some of the reason for the low U.S. score is that some carriers in the U.S. built their 4G networks around 20MHz for their initial rollouts (Verizon and AT&T) and the LTE networks for Sprint and MetroPCS were built around 10MHz. Meanwhile, the European operators used 40MHz when they built their 4G LTE pipelines.

source: OpenSignal via GIGaom

Sweden has the fastest LTE service on the planet

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Alan, an ardent smartphone enthusiast and a veteran writer at PhoneArena since 2009, has witnessed and chronicled the transformative years of mobile technology. Owning iconic phones from the original iPhone to the iPhone 15 Pro Max, he has seen smartphones evolve into a global phenomenon. Beyond smartphones, Alan has covered the emergence of tablets, smartwatches, and smart speakers.

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