Tests Show Lightning Fast Networking Performance on iPhone XS

Based on some early tests performed by the folks over at MacWorld, the latest iPhones show a massive boost in networking performance with significantly fast download and upload speeds on both cellular and WiFi. 

With the iPhone XS and XS Max, Apple has upgraded to a more robust and capable modem i.e. the Intel XMM 7560 with 4×4 MIMO support, which is also why you can see a couple more antenna lines on the top and bottom edges of the phone. 

The new XS models also support new carrier technologies, like T-Mobile’s 600MHz Band 71 and Sprint’s HPUE (High-Performance User Equipment). 

From inside our office building in downtown San Francisco, six floors up, we can see that our Wi-Fi download speed is only a little faster, but upload speed is improved over 45 percent. Connected to T-Mobile’s cellular network (which has often struggled in our Macworld offices), upload performance is similar but download performance is about 77 percent faster!

Notable improvements were measured when testing residential Wi-Fi with a Comcast connection and T-Mobile service outside of San Francisco. While both phones max out the 12 megabits upstream connection, the iPhone XS was able to keep up with the cable connection’s much higher download performance (see below).

Even in less than ideal cellular connectivity, the iPhone XS seems to perform a lot better than the iPhone X, with download performance getting 26% better and upload performance almost 2.8 times faster.

It must however be kept in mind that your own experience may vary depending on your cellular provider, location, and the network load on your WiFi connection.