U.S.4G Speeds Have Increased to 30 Mbps in Major Cities

Average U.S. mobile operator 4G download speeds have climbed, says OpenSignal. T-Mobile US and Verizon have crossed the 20 Mbps threshold for average 4G download speeds, a benchmark OpenSignal thought a “quite distant” possibility just a year ago.

And while Verizon and T-Mobile US battle for the title of “fastest network,” Sprint has made strides. T-Mobile average 4G download speeds increased more than 2 Mbps to 21.6 Mbps since January 2018,, while Verizon users experienced a nearly 3 Mbps boost to bring their average LTE download speed to 20.6 Mbps.

Over the past year, T-Mobile's measured LTE download speeds have increased 24 percent in 12 months, while Verizon's have jumped 38 percent.

Those gains are notable, in the case of Verizon, since speeds generally declined after Verizon introduced its unlimited usage plans.

AT&T, meanwhile, boosted its  average LTE download speed 17 percent over 12 months to 15.1 Mbps, OpenSignal says.

Also, Sprint LTE download speed jumped 48 percent to 14.5 Mbps.

OpenSignal attributes the gains to deployment of LTE-Advanced across all four operators' networks, and suggests more is coming.

“In 10 of the cities we examined, either Verizon or T-Mobile (or both) averaged 4G download speeds of 30 Mbps or greater in our measurements,” says OpenSignal. “ In the largest city in the U.S., New York, we clocked Verizon's average 4G downstream connection at 33.9 Mbps.”