In mobile internet speed, Minnesota and Minneapolis run laps around Milwaukee and Wisconsin

Rick Barrett | Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Wisconsin and Milwaukee ranked in the bottom half of states and cities for mobile-phone internet speeds, while our neighbors to the north — Minnesota and Minneapolis — topped the list, according to a new national report.

The report is from Seattle-based Ookla, the firm behind Speedtest, a widely used tool for measuring internet speeds based on what the firm says is real-world data from millions of consumers.

In the latest rankings of the 50 states plus the District of Columbia, Minnesota was ranked No. 1 for mobile-device internet, with an average download speed of 36.80 megabits per second over mobile devices; followed by Michigan, at 32.63, and New Jersey, Ohio, Massachusetts and Rhode Island rounding out states with the fastest speeds.

Wyoming was slowest at 14.28 mbps, followed by Alaska, Mississippi, Maine and West Virginia.

Wisconsin ranked 36th with an average download speed of 23.56 mbps, nearly tied with Kentucky and Nevada.

Among 100 cities, Minneapolis was fastest, averaging 44.92 mbps, followed by neighboring St. Paul, then Fort Wayne, Ind., San Francisco and Irvine, Calif.

Milwaukee ranked 67th, at 26.17 mbps, tied with Albuquerque, N.M.

Madison was third-slowest, at 20.29, with Laredo, Texas, and Anchorage, Alaska, coming in last and second to last respectively.

T-Mobile was the fastest mobile carrier in 31 states, faring especially well in the Southeast, Southwest and the West Coast.

Verizon was the fastest in 13 states, including much of the Upper Midwest and the Northeast.

“The breadth of Verizon’s LTE network is widely known in the industry, but it can be challenging to offer vast coverage along with fast speeds everywhere,” Ookla said.

“Sprint has delivered the most improved download speeds over the past year. While still the slowest of the four major carriers, the gap between Sprint and AT&T has been closing,” the report noted.

Mobile speeds can vary by phone, according to Ookla.

“The Samsung Galaxy S9 is significantly faster than the iPhone X. The difference in speed between these two devices seems to come from the fact that the Galaxy S9 is powered by the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon X20 LTE modem,” the report said.

The U.S. ranked 43rd among countries for average download speeds over mobile devices, between Hong Kong and Portugal.

The fastest speeds were in Qatar, Norway and the United Arab Emirates.

Networks can become congested

Average download speeds over mobile in the U.S. increased more than 20 percent from early 2017 to 27.33 mbps early this year, the Ookla data showed.

Mostly, the nation’s largest cities topped rural areas in mobile internet speeds, not surprising given the carriers put more emphasis on places with a higher number of customers.

RELATED: Wisconsin groups join Microsoft's effort to close the rural broadband gap

RELATED: The digital divide between urban and rural areas remains, and some question government grants aimed at addressing it

“However, rural areas comprise about 97 percent of the country’s land mass, and some carriers cover that wide area more thoroughly than others," Ookla said.

Download speeds represent how quickly you can pull data from an internet server to your device, with higher speeds being helpful in loading web pages and streaming video.

"Most of the things we are doing with our phones are downloads," said Nikki Asay, an Ookla spokeswoman.

A fast upload speed is helpful when sending large files via email, or in using a video chat to talk with someone else online.

Generation Z is bored with the Internet According to teens, even though they're swiping and clicking away, often times they aren't REALLY doing anything on their phones. Tony Spitz has the details.

Many things can affect speeds, including the cell towers and other equipment that carriers have in an area, and how many people are on the network at the same time.

"A network can get congested," Asay said, which is why speeds sometimes lag in the biggest cities.

The next generation of mobile-device technology, called 5G, could usher in some big changes in 2019, including faster upload speeds than what are available on what's called the LTE system.

RELATED: The U.S. just took a key step to making 5G smartphones a reality

"2019 may very well see the merger of T-Mobile and Sprint, which could result in a very powerful 5G network," Ookla said.

"5G is on the horizon, but for now LTE is still the name of the game as mobile carriers in the United States continue to invest in and fine-tune their infrastructure to improve speeds," the firm said.