GWS tests Rio carrier networks ahead of Olympics

TIM came out on top of recent testing of Rio de Janeiro carrier networks, but visitors should expect spotty coverage at some of the city’s most popular tourist attractions, according to benchmarking by Global Wireless Solutions.
The Rio 2016 Olympic Games start on Friday and as many as 500,000 foreign visitors are expected. GWS recently conducted testing at more than a dozen Olympic and non-Olympic tourist locations across the four major carriers serving Rio: Vivo, TIM, Oi and Claro, which are all expecting massive increases in data use during the Olympics. TIM received the highest score overall with GWS’ OneScore metric, which combines benchmark testing with data on how consumers use their mobile devices and which services they prioritize. The final scores between the top two carriers were very close: TIM scored 87% for speed and reliability at Olympic venues and 78% at non-Olympic tourist spots. Claro scored 79% in non-Olympic venues but 86% in Olympic venues. GWS tested usage scenarios that included music and video streaming, video calling, and social media browsing and posting. View an interactive map of the results here.
“From a reliability perspective, the performance of the Olympic locations was quite a bit better than the non-Olympic locations,” said Paul Carter, CEO of GWS. “The most notable poor performance location was the Christ the Redeemer statue, both on the train and at the statue itself.” He said that the poorest-performing network at that location, Vivo, had just a 38% chance of successful uploads of photos and video – and even the best network, TIM, had only an 89% success rate for uploads.
In terms of LTE coverage, Olympic locations boasted almost 100% LTE coverage across all four Rio carrier networks, according to GWS’ testing. For tourist-specific locations, GWS said TIM and Claro had the highest percentages of LTE coverage. GWS concluded that Copacabana Beach and the Sambadrome were the best-connected locations, with all four operators scoring well for speed and network availability.
 

Source:GWS
Carter said the tests involved using Samsung Galaxy S7s with local SIM cards, as opposed to roaming-based testing using SIM cards from other countries and carriers. GWS tested the cellular networks, and Carter said that when GWS did its testing in early to mid-June, GWS “didn’t see very much Wi-Fi” – which may have changed in the weeks since, he added.
User experience also could be impacted by network loading. GWS conducted its tests amid Rio’s usual daily network loads, and the company noted that average download throughputs were between 4 and 9 megabits per second across the four carriers. Under heavy network loads from hundreds of thousands of additional users, those average throughputs are likely to decrease unless carriers have added sufficient extra capacity. Comparatively, Carter said, GWS has documented speeds of 7-10 Mbps from the four U.S. carriers on a fully loaded network at a major sporting venue hosting around 70,000 fans.