Lincoln Financial Field, home of the Eagles

Speedtest Cellular Internet Results

Lincoln Financial Field | 2017 Season

Carrier speeds based on Speed Score for modern devices Carrier Speed Score Verizon Wireless 27.90 AT&T 17.52 Sprint 12.61 T-Mobile 8.70

Gillette Stadium, where the Patriots go to win

Speedtest Cellular Internet Results

Gillette Stadium | 2017 Season

Carrier speeds based on Speed Score for modern devices Carrier Speed Score Verizon Wireless 76.56 Sprint 30.76 T-Mobile 23.75 AT&T 21.93

U.S. Bank Stadium, the place to be on Sunday

Season internet speeds play-by-play

Team cellular vs. team Wi-Fi

Speedtest Cellular and Mobile Wi-Fi Results

U.S. Bank Stadium | 2017 Season

Stadium speeds based on mean speeds for all results Day Cell - Mean Download (Mbps) Cell - Mean Upload (Mbps) Wi-Fi - Mean Download (Mbps) Wi-Fi - Mean Upload (Mbps) Sep 11, 2017 59.61 23.14 27.87 28.45 Sep 24, 2017 38.99 18.30 21.65 25.75 Oct 1, 2017 41.98 21.35 21.82 28.07 Oct 15, 2017 62.54 23.54 29.37 25.92 Oct 22, 2017 53.05 26.83 30.01 29.11 Nov 19, 2017 69.02 24.97 22.03 25.38 Dec 17, 2017 59.25 22.05 18.84 17.65 Dec 31, 2017 63.15 22.88 14.10 16.41

Meanwhile, the Wi-Fi might be free at U.S. Bank Stadium and the average speed does exceed that of the free Wi-Fi we’ve seen at many North American airports, including LAX and JFK, but it’s still not as fast as we’d hoped. Especially given all the hype. Free Wi-Fi is a great resource to have, but in most cases you’ll get faster speeds using your mobile carrier’s network on game day.

Carrier performance

Speedtest Cellular Internet Results

U.S. Bank Stadium | 2017 Season

Carrier speeds based on Speed Score for modern devices Carrier Speed Score T-Mobile 87.44 Verizon Wireless 73.74 AT&T 52.96 Sprint 42.15

What to expect during the big game

AT&T’s upgrades include deploying over 800 antennas throughout the stadium, providing a more than 200% increase in capacity. Additional legacy spectrum assets have been refarmed (Band 5) and coupled with advanced LTE technologies. AT&T is expected to keep up with the increased traffic demand.

Verizon has added 48% more antenna nodes at the stadium, which are largely invisible (tucked under the seats, handrails, etc.). In addition to over 50 MHz of deployed capacity, Verizon is activating Higher Order MIMO and Higher Order Modulation together with three-channel carrier aggregation. You could say Verizon has their game face on.

Sprint’s network within the stadium also relies on 800 nodes and a distributed antenna system (DAS) powered by small cells. This will deliver 40 MHz of TDD capacity in the 2.5 GHz frequency band. Sprint will rely on two-channel carrier aggregation in the downlink to provide required downlink capacity. It will be interesting to see if this network configuration will be sufficient to support the inevitable spike in upload traffic, especially during halftime.

T-Mobile has increased the node capacity within the stadium by a factor of 30 in addition to the already deployed 4x4 MIMO, 256 QAM and three-channel carrier aggregation LTE techniques. They have also allocated additional spectrum assets to LTE in order to provide 45 MHz of downlink capacity, upgraded backhaul at and around the event and centralized radio access technology by the way of uplink CoMP (Coordinated Multipoint). This centralized radio access technology is designed to improve uplink data rates and network efficiency, with the added benefit of extending a smartphone’s battery life.

Game day stats

Cellular speeds

Speedtest Cellular Internet Results

U.S. Bank Stadium | During the Big Game

Stadium speeds based on mean speeds for all results Day Cell - Mean Download (Mbps) Cell - Mean Upload (Mbps) Feb 4, 2018 69.09 15.93

Which carrier won?

Speedtest Cellular Internet Results

U.S. Bank Stadium | During the Big Game

Carrier speeds based on Speed Score for modern devices Carrier Speed Score T-Mobile 114.72 AT&T 58.54 Verizon Wireless 50.66 Sprint 33.24

Comparing carriers based on Speed Score between 3:30 p.m. and 8 p.m. on Sunday, T-Mobile not only came out on top, but they trounced their season average, with a 31.2% jump in speeds. T-Mobile’s game-winning Speed Score was also 96.0% faster than runner-up AT&T who came in second and saw a 10.5% increase in speeds on game day. Despite significant efforts on the technology side, the other two major carriers saw declines in Speed Scores on the big day. Verizon Wireless came in third and saw a 31.3% decrease from their season average while Sprint’s fourth-place finish was 21.1% slower than their all-season number.

How ‘bout that Wi-Fi?

Speedtest Mobile Wi-Fi Results

U.S. Bank Stadium | During the Big Game

Stadium speeds based on mean speeds for all results Day Wi-Fi - Mean Download (Mbps) Wi-Fi - Mean Upload (Mbps) Feb 4, 2018 20.71 23.36

Was the big game worth the big investment? Likely. Huge crowds hungry to share the experience on social media can clog up networks and destroy cellular speeds. We’ll be interested to see how this year’s performance changes carriers’ playbooks for 2019.!