What is the best mobile operator in 2021, in 4G? The telecoms regulator's new measurement campaign puts Orange in the lead and Free Mobile last.

Which mobile operator can claim to have the best network in 2021, between Orange, Free Mobile, Bouygues Telecom and SFR?

The answer to this question will in fact be different depending on the criterion observed, the location of the measurement or the circumstances. Sometimes, one operator can do better than another on a test done in the metro, but have more difficulty in rural areas. But even if the case by case prevails, major trends still emerge from the annual campaigns of the telecom regulator.

In general, Orange is positioned at the top of the results overall. Then follow Bouygues Telecom and SFR, which show similar results. As for Free Mobile, it brings up the rear. This place is not very flattering, but it should be remembered that the group's activities in mobile are barely ten years old. In some segments, it is evenly matched with its rivals. In others, the gap is still significant.

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The regulator took more than 1.5 million measurements to decide between the four operators. // Source: Frandroid

A comparison of useful operators, but to be handled with care

Beware of drawing too hasty conclusions that these different comparative tables are likely to produce. All the values ​​given below together with the various comments constitute a general summary of the work of the regulator for 2021. An isolated person may experience poor mobile quality, even if they are in an area with very good coverage.

The comparison between operators must be made as closely as possible to their situation — i.e. where they live, where they work, the type of transport to get there, but also the uses that one with his mobile. Someone who never watches videos with their smartphone may consider that a criterion on streaming is much less relevant than the quality of a phone call.

The fact remains that even if this comparison has certain limits, it provides a very good picture of the quality of mobile networks in France, thanks to the vast evaluation campaigns carried out every year by the Autorité de regulation of electronic communications and postal services (Arcep). This also makes it possible to observe the reduction of the digital divide and the increase in speeds.

To go furtherCalls, SMS, 4G: is the mobile coverage good at home? Judge for yourself with this map

ARCEP provides a very practical mapping tool, called My Mobile Network, which allows you to inquire about the level of coverage near your home or at your work.

In town and in the countryside

Mobile quality and average speeds

Network quality throughout the country

< tbody>< td>3.8

Operator	Bouygues	Free Mobile	Orange	SFR
Calls held for 2 minutes with perfect quality	91%	90%	93%	92%
SMS received in less than 10 seconds	94%	92%	96%	94%
Voice Quality	3.8	3.6	3.7
Web	94%	94%	98%	94%
Streaming	91%	89%< /td>	93%	90%
Downstream rates	55 Mbit/s	50 Mbit/s	110 Mbit/s	69 Mbit/s
Upload speeds	14 Mbps	10 Mbps	18 Mbps	12 Mbps
Bit rate >3 Mbit/s	89%	90%	96%	90%

In dense areas (15 largest cities)

< td>92%

Operator	Bouygues< /td>	Free Mobile	Orange	SFR
Calls held for 2 minutes with perfect quality	97%	96%	97%	97%
SMS received in less than 10 seconds	98%	96%	98%	98%
Voice quality	3.8	3.7	3.9	3 .8
Web	99%	97%	99%	98%
Streaming	95%	91%	92%
Downstream rates	83 Mbit/s	47 Mbit/s	148 Mbit/s	102 Mbit/s
Upload speeds	21 Mbit/s	12 Mbit /s	24 Mbit/s	17 Mbit/s
Bit rate >3 Mbit/s	98%	95%	98%	97%

< h4>In intermediate zone (cities with 10,000 to 400,000 inhabitants)< /tr>

Operator	Bouygues	Free Mobile< /td>	Orange	SFR
Calls held for 2 minutes with perfect quality	96%	95%	97%	96%
SMS received in less than 10 seconds	97%	95%	99%	97%
Voice quality	3.8	3.7	3.9	3.8
Web	98%	96%	99%	97%
Streaming	92%	92%	96%	92%
Download rates	51 Mbit/s	57 Mbit/s	119 Mbit/s	68 Mbit/s
Upload speeds	14 Mbit/s	12 Mbit/s	20 Mbit/s	13 Mbit/s
Bit rate >3 Mbit/s	92%	94%	99%	94%

In rural areas (cities under 10,000 inhabitants)

< /tr>

Operator	Bouygues	Free Mobile	Orange	SFR
Calls held for 2 minutes with perfect quality	81%	80%	85%	83%
SMS received in less than 10 seconds	86%	87%	90%	86%
Voice quality	3.6	3.5	3.7	3.6
Web	87%	89%	95%	87%
Streaming< /td>	87%	86%	91%	85%
Bitrates downstream	30 Mbit/s	48 Mbit/s	64 Mbit/s	41 Mbit/s
Upload rates	7 Mbit/s	6 Mbit/s	10 Mbit/s	7 Mbit/s
Bit rate >3 Mbit/s	92%	94%	99%	94%

The 100 most visited places in France

< /thead>< td>97%< tr>

Operator	Bouygues	Free Mobile	Orange	SFR
Calls held for 2 minutes with perfect quality	93%	91%	95%	93%
SMS messages received in less than 10 seconds	94%	91%	95%
Voice Quality	3.8	3.6< /td>	3.8	3.8
Web	92%	92%	98%	93%
Streaming	91%	85%	94%	89%
Downstream speeds	63 Mbit/s	45 Mbit/s	115 Mbit/s	62 Mbit/s
Upload rates	15 Mbit/s	10 Mbit/s	20 Mbit/s	11 Mbit/s
Bit rates >3 Mbps	88%	88%	97%	89%

Bouygues Telecom and SFR

Concerning SFR and Bouygues Telecom, the regulator notes that the former is "progressing to the point of placing itself at the same level as Bouygues Telecom", particularly in the roads, while the second "maintained its performance". In general, the results of the two operators are close, even identical. This is not a curiosity: it is the result of a partnership between the two groups.

Indeed, Bouygues Telecom and SFR are working hand in hand on extending their mobile coverage, thanks to a pooling contract on 2G, 3G and 4G as well as a roaming contract on the network. 4G. It is for this reason that the results of the two operators are often close. This is the case for speeds, but also for voice and SMS.

And Free Mobile?

Long gone are the days when Free Mobile cut prices, but did not break the bank in terms of telephone performance or mobile Internet. In the eyes of the telecoms regulator, the fourth entrant “approaches the level of quality offered by Bouygues Telecom and SFR”. In particular, the group has “significantly better performance than last year”.

Of course, we must take into account the fact that Free Mobile is the last of the four operators to have launched into mobile telephony. However, this explanation constitutes an excuse whose impact tends to diminish over time: Free Mobile has now been in this market for more than six years. The pretext of youth to forgive differences in quality with the competition is less and less acceptable.

Coverage in transport

Coverage of motorways and 20 secondary roads

< tr>

Operator	Bouygues Telecom	Free Mobile	Orange	SFR
2-minute calls	91%	84%	93%	88%
SMS received in less than 10 seconds	96%	82%	96%	94%
Voice quality	3.8	3.4	3.9	3.7
Web pages loaded in less than 10 seconds	95%	93%	97%	94%

Orange's 4G coverage on the road network, measured by the regulator, with data from November 2020.

Coverage of TGV lines

< /tbody>

Operator	Bouygues Telecom	Free Mobile	Orange	SFR
2 minute calls	66%	63%	79%	64%
SMS received in less than 10 seconds	78%	62%	84%	76%
Voice quality	3.5	3.2	3.6	3.4
Web pages loaded in less than 10 seconds	72%	72%	85%	71%

Bouygues Telecom's 4G coverage on the TGV network, measured by the regulator, with data from November 2020.

Coverage of Intercités and 50 TER

< td>Orange< td> 65%< td>3.6

Operator	Bouygues Telecom	Free Mobile	SFR
2-minute calls	65%	72%	64%
SMS received in less than 10 seconds	77%	65%	80%	74%
Voice quality	3.3	3.7	3.5
Pages web loads in less than 10 seconds	76%	74%	77%	73%

Mobile Internet coverage for intercity and TER. Data from 2019.

RER and Transiliens coverage

Operator	Bouygues Telecom	Free Mobile	Orange	SFR
2-minute calls	90%	84%	90%	85%
SMS received in less than 10 seconds	92 %	87%	94%	91%
Voice quality	3.9	3.5	4	3.8
Web pages loaded in less than 10 seconds	89%	87%	95%	88%

The situation for RER and Transiliens, in terms of mobile coverage in 2019.

Metro coverage (Paris, Lyon, Marseille, etc.)

< /tr>

Operator	Bouygues Telecom	Free Mobile	Orange	SFR
2-minute calls	86 %	85%	89%	87%
SMS received in less than 10 seconds< /td>	88%	73%	91%	89%
Quality voice	4	3.6	4	3.9
Web pages loaded in less than 10 seconds	95%	92%	95%	94%

Focus on the level of mobile coverage for the Paris metro. Data from 2019.

Profile of tests

The measurement campaign for 2021 took place from May to September, in health circumstances that were clearly better than last year. More than a million measurements in 2G, 3G and 4G have been carried out, with different scenarios: inside and outside buildings, in more or less densely populated places, in immobility or moving in transport .

As for uses, the focus has been on those that are most common: phone calls, text messages, viewing web pages and videos, as well as downloading and sending files. In total, the telecoms regulator relied on 266 indicators to assess the performance of the networks of the four operators, "in a strictly comparable manner, and under diversified conditions of use", he specifies.

The uses of interest to the regulator are:

Over the years, the regulator has changed its tests to correspond "as closely as possible to French practices". It may be a matter of checking, above all, calls from mobile to mobile (calls to a landline no longer really being used), establishing a speed rate above a certain threshold (3 Mbit/s) to determine navigation in suitable conditions, “without major slowdown”, etc.

In 2021, the call setup time is taken into account, i.e. the waiting time before the first ring. The measurements reveal a balance between operators, whether in town or in the countryside. Orange is 1.9 seconds behind, as is Bouygues Telecom, followed by SFR (2 seconds). Free Mobile is 3 seconds. In town, the average delay is 2.1 seconds, against 2.4 seconds in the countryside.

Better 4G coverage

4G is still largely the most widely used generation of mobile telephony in France, even though 5G has been rolling out for almost a year. Indeed, not all of the population yet have a smartphone compatible with ultra-high speed mobile or an appropriate subscription. In addition, 5G coverage of the country will take a long time: it will only be complete after 2030.

For a few more years, it is above all 4G coverage that matters – there are still a few final areas to be served, but things are progressing. The New Deal Mobile pan sets such a deadline at the end of 2022. This is a distant horizon for people residing in these connectivity holes, but operators are faced with areas that are very sparsely populated or very difficult to access.

Today, the metrics for all four carriers are excellent, with at least 99% population coverage, including Free Mobile, whose mobile business is barely a decade old. As for the coverage of the territory, it is less satisfactory: depending on the case, there are still 6 and 10% of the surface of the country in the white zone. There is barely a year left to hold the New Deal Mobile.

< td>90%

Operator	Orange	Free Mobile	Bouygues	SFR
4G population coverage (June 30, 2021)	99+%	99%	99+%	99+%
4G territory coverage (June 30, 2021)	93%	92%	94%

The regulator is closely monitoring this case, so as to oblige operators to maintain "their efforts so that 4G benefits the greatest number of people throughout the territory, and that the performance gaps between rural and dense areas are gradually reduced". These additional measurements supplement the announcements of the operators, which tend to overlook the coverage of the territory.

An interactive display with simulated coverage maps is available on the My Mobile Network site. It's very practical to know the state of the network near you, at your home, in your city or at your place of work, and thus see the situation according to your place of life, rather than reasoning on averages at too impersonal a level, which says nothing about the local situation.

Agreements between operators to use the networks

While each mobile telephone operator strives to build its own infrastructure so as not to have to depend on a competing network, you should know that it There are nevertheless agreements between the various protagonists to circulate certain electronic communications via the relay antennas of a rival, which can considerably complicate the choice between this or that offer.

In the case of Orange, all its communications pass exclusively through its network. On the other hand, the incumbent operator has signed a roaming agreement on 2G and 3G so that Free Mobile customers can access the Orange network while it builds its own. Signed in 2011, it has been gradually fading since 2015. The two partners will extend it until 2022, instead of ending it in 2020.

Arrived after all the others, Free Mobile had to find a partner to get in the saddle. The company founded by Xavier Niel concluded an agreement with Orange in 2011 to use its network when 2G and 3G telecommunications occur. As its own network grows, Free Mobile has less and less need for Orange. But for 4G, Free Mobile manages on its own.

Concerning Bouygues Telecom, the situation is mixed: it uses its network to route 2G, 3G and 4G connections, but you should know that a sharing agreement has existed since January 2014 with SFR for a shared mobile network on part of of the territory. This is the reason why the two operators sometimes have very similar results in measurement campaigns.

Of course, it's the same thing at SFR. The Altice subsidiary relies on the one hand on its own telephone network for 2G, 3G and 4G but also on the infrastructures set up jointly with Bouygues Telecom as part of this pooling agreement. It should be noted that this agreement includes a 4G roaming service for SFR customers on part of the Bouygues Telecom network.

(updated in November with the new measurement campaign)

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