We are no strangers with getting our hands dirty in the quest of finding who reigns in data speeds, we’ve done this before in 2013 where we published our finds on who had the fastest 4G-LTE network in Uganda, and today we make want to put 3G data speeds into the mix. With new players like Vodafone, and the fact that 3G was left out in the previous tests we decided to go the whole nine yards. The companies have upped each other on several data offers and it is clear that the competition among the Uganda’s major mobile networks — MTN, Orange/Africell, Smile, Smart Telecom, Airtel, Vodafone, and UTL— is reaching new heights of aggression. But one thing we often hear from these mobile carriers is how “good” their 3G or 4G LTE networks are.
These companies either have the highest number of data users, the largest data footprint, or the most data devices on the market. For customers, though, the only thing that matters about these data services is how much it’s going to cost them, and how fast it’s going to be.
“We executed these tests five times to calculate a fair average and maximum download speeds”
If you’re looking for guidance on the data prices,we already have tons of helpful information about carrier plan pricing here. But when it comes to data speeds, we recently conducted real-world download data tests to get a snapshot of how fast these networks are performing. These tests were carried out only in Kampala, in six separate locations, viz: City Center (CDB) near KCCA HQ, Ntinda, Wandegeya, Game Lugogo, Garden City and Clement Hill, where all carriers’ 3G and 4G LTE networks are active in similar network conditions, on the same day simultaneously.
Locations where tests were carried out
We executed these tests five times to calculate fair average and maximum download speeds on the respective carrier’s data modems, with all devices being wiped and reset beforehand, just like how you would receive them out of the box.
3G tests were done on: Africell, MTN, Airtel, Smart Telecom and UTL
4G-LTE tests were done on : MTN, Africell, Smart and Vodafone
It’s important to keep in mind that these tests are not comprehensive or exhaustive. Although we took measures to be as fair and thorough as possible, these results offer just a glimpse of the networks’ 3G and 4G LTE speeds with each carrier’s own approved devices. You can find more test details at the end of this post.
If you’re thinking about switching carriers, be sure to research how well the others perform in your particular area. And as always, let us know what you think in the reader comments below. Please note that our tests are for only download speeds, there are no upload speeds captured.
The fastest 3G networks in Uganda are 22 times faster than Smart Telecom
Hint: All Graphs below are interactive
Africell and MTN performed well in both 3G and 4G in comparison to each other, with an overall average download speed of 6 Mbps and 13 Mbps in 3G and 4G LTE respectively. Unfortunately, Smart Telecom and UTL’s 3G speeds fell behind the others and consistently clocked low rates at every trial. The results further show that the fastest 3G networks in Uganda (MTN and Africell) are 22 times faster than Smart Telecom. Airtel Uganda came with an average download speed of 2 Mbps while UTL was half that a value.
Overall 3G Download speeds
[blockquote]Note: Longer bars indicate better performance On the 4G-LTE side of things, new player Vodafone registered dissatisfactory results compared to the competition, scoring a maximum of 5 Mbps on average. There were some cases where operators like Vodafone had no or poor 4G coverage in areas like Wandegeya and Ntinda which affected their overall score. Smile Communication’s low data throughput values can be attributed to many factors that we’ve previously reported. [blockquote]
Overall 4G LTE Download speeds
Note: Longer bars indicate better performance
“Africell has sofar managed to maintain the data speeds Orange left behind”
All in all, Africell has sofar managed to keep up the data speeds Orange left, with a very slight edge over 
MTN. Uganda’s biggest telecom company is surely giving Africell a run for its money when it comes to data speeds. In addition, while Vodafone remained the slowest 4G LTE carrier in the areas we did our tests, it’s delta in load times wasn’t that much slower.
We can confidently say that if it’s speed that you are looking for, MTN and Africell are a better bet all in all. Again, data speeds depend on many variables, including your location and time of day. What you personally experience from these networks may differ from the results shown above. Furthermore, all carriers are working continuously to broaden and speed up their 3G and 4G- LTE coverage, so don’t be surprised if these results change in the near future.
In our previous smack-down, we used Ookla’s Speedtest.net app to measure download speeds, we’ve now made some changes and adopted the use of Nemo tools, DU Meter & Filezilla. The Ookla app limits in the size of the file you have to download and we wanted no restrictions. For best results we used FTP (file transfer protocol) server for the tests, in which we downloaded a media file of about 400MB for LTE and 100 MB for 3G with several repetitions. The files were located on a server that is external to all networks.
Note: These tests where independently conducted solely by the techjaja team, as per our ethics statement NO telecom or any other agents of any telecom company in Uganda sponsored these tests.
