When traveling abroad we have two options to use our mobile phone, either to make calls or to surf the Internet. The first of the alternatives involves roaming rates, a free concept in the countries of the European Union for a few years. Here we will have to be careful with the limits that the unlimited rates hide. The second alternative is to buy a SIM for travel or a card in the destination country. If we choose the first option, especially when traveling in Europe, we must know what the average speed of navigation that we will have in each of the countries will be.
When we travel to countries of the European Union (EU) and European Economic Area (EEA) such as Germany, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Cyprus, Denmark, Slovakia, Slovenia, Estonia, Finland, France, Gibraltar, Greece, Guadeloupe, French Guiana, Holland, Hungary, Ireland, Martinique Island, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Norway, Poland, Portugal (Madeira and Azores), United Kingdom, Romania, Sweden, Saint Martin and Mayotte , we can use our national rate to talk and navigate with the limits established by contract.
Roaming speed European Union in 2021
The problem comes when we take advantage of our rate to navigate in one of those countries. According to a recent speed study, we lose an average of 20% speed while roaming compared to the average offered to citizens of that country who use exactly the same networks . In some countries, the speed loss exceeds 65%, so we will not have as satisfactory an experience as we might hope.
During the first quarter of 2021, 19 of the 26 countries analyzed offered less speed than the local average speed in the same period. Countries such as Cyprus and Malta were left out of these measurements as they had few samples to analyze in the period in question. Of the seven countries that offered a better roaming connection than local ones, Latvia offered 23.4% more speed, Estonia 22.8% more speed and Ireland 19.5% more than the inhabitants of the country.
The country in which tourists noticed the slowdown the most was in the Netherlands. While the citizens of the country themselves surfed at 77.52 Mbps, roaming visitors had only 26.48 Mbps of average speed. Similar situation in Denmark with 50.11 Mbps for locals and 22.18 Mbps for roaming. The third country in which the fall was most marked was Bulgaria with 61.76 Mbps for citizens and 29.74 Mbps for roaming.
In Spain, the average mobile browsing speed is 23.78 Mbps, while we offer 18.21 Mbps of average speed to foreigners who visit us and use roaming. The loss of speed in Spain between the two measurements is 23.4%.