In the annual Umlaut Best in Test standings, Rogers emerged as the frontrunner among its wireless rivals, for the fifth year in a row.
Scoring an overall 889 out of a potential 1000, Rogers edged past both Bell and Telus, which trailed with scores of 874 and 859, respectively.
The extensive testing parameters incorporated a vast measuring distance of 30,000 km, covering 59% of the population. The ‘Build-up Area’ achieved a remarkable coverage of 98.8%, while the ‘Population Area’ was closely behind at 98.6%. The cumulative size of the area tested spanned an impressive 655,862 km^2.
Voice tests were made on a Samsung Galaxy S21+5G, while data was tested with a Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra 5G.
For voice, Mobile-to-Mobile (M2M) tests had a 115-second call window with a 70-second call duration, and a 15-second call setup timeout. Both devices were set to prefer 5G with VoLTE. Data tests, conducted in a 5G preferred mode, incorporated HTTP downlink and uplink streams of 7 seconds each, 10MB HTTP downlink and 5MB uplink fixed file transfers, and various web browsing sessions alongside YouTube video stream evaluations.
Benchmarking took the form of drive tests, emphasizing a range across urban and rural terrains: 50-70% in cities, 10-25% in towns, and 10-40% on connecting roads. Throughout the testing phase, approximately 37,000 samples were garnered for each operator, accumulating close to 310,000 samples in total.
Below, you can see the scores for voice, data and crowdsourced quality comparing Rogers, Bell and Telus. Overall, the scores do not differ by huge margins by any means.
This dedicated period of testing stretched from March 27, 2023, to June 7, 2023. Alongside this, Umlaut also analyzed crowdsourced data collected over a span of 24 weeks, starting from December 26, 2022, up to June 11, 2023. All voice tests were administered with both devices set in a 5G preferred mode, switching up the call origins for diversity.
Detailed comparative analyses of the performance results observed for the various tested services will follow in the subsequent sections.
Cities measured include Halifax, Moncton, Quebec, Sherbrooke, Montreal, Ottawa, Oshawa, Toronto, Hamilton, Guelph, Kitchener, Brantford, Windsor, Victoria, Vancouver, Abbotsford, Calgary, Lethbridge, Edmonton, Saskatoon, and Winnipeg.
Towns measured encompass Fredericton, Miramichi, Bathurst, Matane, Rimouski, Rivière-du-Loup, Saguenay, Alma, Dolbeau-Mistassini, and more.
“We are continually investing in our networks to deliver wireless services Canadians can rely on,” said Ron McKenzie, Chief Technology & Information Officer, Rogers Communications, in a statement on Tuesday. “We are extremely proud to be recognized by umlaut, a global leader in mobile network testing and benchmarking, as having the best, most reliable wireless network in the country.”
Back in 2021, Rogers was named ‘Best in Test’ in the same study by umlaut that it commissioned. For this latest study, Rogers confirmed with iPhone in Canada it did not commission the study.
