Comparing metro-area cellular and WiFi performance

Abstract

Cellular and 802.11 WiFi offer two compelling connectivity options for mobile users. The goal of our work is to better understand performance characteristics of these technologies in diverse environments and conditions. To that end, we compare and contrast cellular and Wifi performance using crowd-sourced data from speedtest.net. We consider spatio-temporal performance aspects (e.g., upload and download throughput and latency) using over 3 million user-initiated tests initiated in 15 different metro areas, collected over 15 weeks. In these preliminary results, we find that WiFi performance generally exceeds cellular performance, and that observed characteristics are highly variable across different locations and times of day. We also observe diverse performance characteristics resulting from the rollout of new cell access technologies and service differences among local providers.