New research from Swindon IT services company, Excalibur, has revealed that only 20% of businesses throughout the South West have access to 5G, and 45% of businesses in England are in the same situation.
5G is the fifth generation of wireless technology, and benefits from lower latency than 4G (the lower the latency, the closer things like video calls are to real-time performance) as well as a 100x increase in traffic capacity and network efficiency.
In a time where video calls and online collaboration is more prominent than ever, having a superior internet connection can be a huge advantage to a company.
Combining data from both Ofcom and the Office for National Statistics, the 5G availability was calculated by charting the number of businesses in each region around the country and comparing this with an Ofcom 5G success rate report.
A 5G connectivity score was calculated by averaging the number of tests and the 5G success rate, with the top score being 100.
The most connected location for 5G access was around Bath and Bristol, with service dropping off when moving towards locations such as Trowbridge and Dursley.
While the minority of businesses had no 5G access, there were hotspots when looking at the South West’s larger cities such as Bristol, Bath, and Bournemouth which all experienced far more reliable 5G connectivity. In fact, the east of Bristol (in the area of Kingswood) showed the 5th best 5G connectivity score in the UK, beaten only by inner London regions.
Other major towns and cities around the South West such as Exeter and Salisbury returned little to no 5G service, with Plymouth having a reliability rate of 45% across 38 5G connection tests.
Swindon was given a score of 4.3/100, the 8th worst score in the whole of the UK!
However, each of those tests had a 100% success rate, we scored low due to Ofcom completing just four tests in the town when they ran over 1,200 tests in East Bristol alone.
Best 5G connectivity scores in the South West:
- East Bristol – 97.3/100
- Bristol City Centre – 89.7/100
- Bath – 78.9/100
- Severn Beach – 56.2/100
- South Bristol – 31.9/100
Peter Boucher, Chief Executive Officer at Excalibur said: “It is absolutely crucial for businesses to have good connectivity, and for such a large amount of companies in the region to be at a disadvantage is a fundamental issue. The expectation and standard is so much higher for video calls and online collaboration nowadays that for things to be subpar can have a really serious impact on the reputation of a business and also their productivity.
“Thankfully 5G will be continued to roll out, and the playing field will eventually become more even, but until then it’s imperative to make sure that companies 4G connections are as strong as they can be to keep up with the constantly moving and changing world, which is now mostly online.”
