Ofcom releases report on poor connectivity on trains

Ofcom has released a report it commissioned from Streetwave detailing the poor performance of mobile connectivity on trains. The report shows that mobile and Wi-Fi performance was deemed poor on between 58% and 83% of tests that were undertaken. The study looked at 50 journeys across 24 rail lines between February and March 2026. It’s worth noting that all networks are currently investing a lot in 5G Standalone (5GSA) rollouts, so the data from this report is likely to already be out of date, as 5GSA coverage is expanding. It also does not look at VodafoneThree as a combined entity; the firm recently announced it had completed the merger of the networks using MOCN and MORAN, so any figures in the report for Vodafone and Three would now be inaccurate.

Across all networks, the report determined that EE delivered ‘Good Performance’ (defined as a phone achieving a download speed of at least 5Mbps and an upload speed of 1.5Mbps with a latency of 50ms) 42% of the time, with the other networks, O2, Three and Vodafone achieving between 17 and 21%. Latency issues were the main reason for tests to fail the Good performance threshold, and the main reason for the issue was a weak mobile signal reaching train passengers. Rural and Intercity rail journeys fared worse than urban journeys. The best performing route was London Victoria to East Croydon, where EE recorded 82% good performance and O2 73%.

The company also looked at on-board Wi-Fi and found the good performance threshold was only met 1% of the time. In theory, on-board Wi-Fi has some advantages – it can connect to multiple networks and therefore provide coverage where your phone might not have signal, and it can also use an external antenna outside the train. However, it is also contended with more passengers, so if you do have a signal, it might perform worse. Although not included in the route testing, South Western Rail was tested to a degree. They recorded higher download speeds than any other train operating company, with the Earlsfield to Basingstoke track section recording a Good
Performance 83.2% of the time. This is because SWR has deployed a next-generation Wi-Fi system that works trackside using 5G millimetre-wave (5G mmWave) technology, which is capable of speeds over 1Gbps (note that some mobile networks refer to 5G mmWave as 5G+ in the US, and this shouldn’t be confused with the marketing term of 5G+ used by some networks in the UK to refer to 5GSA).

The conclusion from the report is somewhat obvious, so much so that it’s already been announced that there are plans to implement it. Use a low-earth orbit (LEO) service from trains to provide a better service. Services such as Starlink, Amazon LEO, and other satellite connectivity providers operating in low-earth orbit can provide a more stable connection with more throughput than can be achieved via a mobile service. Connecting a phone or personal device to an onboard service using this is something ScotRail, GWR and SWR have already begun to look at. Also, the 5g mmWave technology being used by SWR is also able to provide a reliable service if it can be rolled out more widely across rail networks. It will be interesting to see if this can be combined successfully with LEO to provide a seamless service to rail users, that also works through tunnels – this may well need to combine 70-year-old technology like ‘leaky feeders’ to keep connectivity working!

In conclusion, the issues of Wi-Fi and mobile service on trains are well known, and the solutions are already being tested and implemented. Has this report from Ofcom actually provided any value?