Don’t chirp now, but Boost Mobile’s NYC network just beat the Big 3 carriers

Boost Mobile has been around for over 20 years, but it’s never competed with the big carriers on a large scale. Until recently a pure MVNO, Boost now operates and develops a standalone 5G network, and partners with T-Mobile and AT&T for long-distance roaming outside its 5G coverage.

Its piecemeal configuration might lead one to assume Boost provides less-than-premium connectivity. At least in New York City, though, that’s clearly not the case. Third-party analysts just released a report on the best mobile carriers within the Big Apple, and Boost Mobile earned the top spot for connection reliability, data performance and reliability, and overall mobile network performance (Source: Boost Mobile Blog).

Success from a name you didn’t expect

Competing with the big names any way possible

In 2007, Kanye West ft. The Game and Ludacris asked, “Where you at?” and tried to sell everybody flip phones.

Millennials might remember Boost Mobile from the popular push-to-talk voice communication technique of “chirping” from the early 2000s. The development of high-speed, always-on cellular data quickly rendered obsolete the iDEN technology spearheaded by Boost’s owner, Nextel. Then Sprint bought Nextel, Dish Network bought Sprint, and Dish merged with EchoStar, leading to a Boost reboot — a reBoost, if you will.

A journeyman status like that doesn’t normally bode well for players in today’s advanced tech industry, but the recent testing by Umlaut shows Boost is leveraging its burgeoning network effectively. The required frequency license took a $20 billion investment, and an additional $10 billion went to building out network infrastructure. That $30 billion commitment underscored EchoStar’s intent to fulfill its promise of expanding Boost coverage to 80% of the US.

What the NYC mobile carrier tests said

What does “the best” even mean anymore?

The firm’s researchers ran a lot of tests, like simple web browsing, downloading files, watching YouTube, streaming YouTube Live, and holding voice chats. Each was performed from both pedestrian (walktest) and driver (drivetest) standpoints. Boost didn’t win every test outright, but its slate of results, as a whole, won it the top spot overall.

The most stark win came in the data performance drivetest and walktest. Only AT&T managed to really hang tough, coming in several percentage points behind Boost in resource-demanding applications like interactive gaming and video chats. Go-to industry leaders Verizon and T-Mobile didn’t perform terribly, but they did fall a few dozen percent behind the other two in the most stringent readings. Boost also edged out AT&T in data reliability, which largely relied on bandwidth consistency. Metrics such as the measurement of a service’s minimum speed 90% of the time played a big factor in this round.

To be fair, the three competitors largely fared well in their own right. Boost couldn’t quite approach the peak download speeds of giants like T-Mobile, which boasted a 267 Mbps 10% minimum metric, compared to Boost’s 10% minimum of 170 Mbps. But most people don’t rely on peak cellular data speeds over 200 Mbps. Based on real-world usage, consistent throughput, and thorough coverage, the Accenture-owned IT research firm pegged Boost Mobile as the best overall.

It’s impressive that the winner came from outside the three major carriers, especially in one of the most densely populated areas of the United States. It might be slightly overkill to view this as be-all, end-all evidence that Boost Mobile is the only choice for new plans in NYC. It’s especially reassuring, though, to learn that the major networks aren’t yet trampling the little guy (relatively speaking), and regional considerations still definitely matter when considering what gadgets and subscriptions are for you.