DICT: PHL ranks 83rd in global mobile internet speed in February

The Philippines’ global mobile internet speed ranking continued to improve in February, climbing by three notches from its previous rank in January, the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) said Wednesday.

Citing a report from internet access performance metrics provider Ookla Speedtest, the DICT said the country is now at the 83rd spot for mobile internet speed worldwide, an improvement from its 86th ranking in the first month of 2021.

Ookla's speed test analysis covers 140 countries.

The Philippines also climbed by eight spots to 92nd in terms of fixed broadband speed from 100th in January.

Under Ookla’s report, the country’s average download speed for February surged to 38.46 megabits per second (Mbps) for fixed broadband and 26.24 Mbps for mobile internet.

“For the fixed broadband category, the jump to the February rating saw a 17.51% or 5.73 Mbps increase from the 32.73 Mbps last January. As for the mobile internet speed, the January figures recorded 25.77 Mbps, showing a slight increase in average download speed,” the DICT said.

The ICT department said the fixed broadband average download speed of 38.46 Mbps for February registered its highest increase since the onset of the Duterte administration—a 386.22% increase from the recorded figure of 7.91 Mbps back in July 2016.

As for mobile, there was a 252.68% increase from its speed of 7.44 Mbps back in July 2016.

“Since the President placed great emphasis on the need to improve the connectivity experience for Filipinos, everyone in government, telecommunication companies, and mobile network operators had been diligently doubling efforts to enhance Internet connectivity and access in the country,” said DICT Secretary Gregorio Honasan II.

Honasan attributed the improved internet speeds to President Rodrigo Duterte’s call during his State of the Nation Address (SONA) that telecommunication companies must shape up to meet the demands of the telecommuting population.

Since the President’s directive last July 2020, the DICT said it has been working with other agencies to expedite permitting requirements to support telcos with their intensified deployment of cellular towers.

“Owing to this, there was a significant increase in the number of cellular towers built from July 2020 to January 2021, totaling 3,211 new towers,” it said.

Moreover, to ensure telcos’ compliance with the President’s directives, the DICT and the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) are closely monitoring the progress of telcos.

“Due to these efforts, the country now ranks 6th for both fixed broadband and mobile categories among the ten ASEAN countries,” it said.

In Asia, the country placed 24th for fixed broadband and 25th for mobile out of 50 countries; and among the 46 Asia-Pacific countries, the Philippines ranks 18th for fixed broadband and 14th for mobile.

“With our combined efforts, the Philippine broadband and mobile network experience had steadily undergone great improvements, and we look forward to what we can further achieve in the coming months,” Honasan said. -MDM, GMA News