Among the 50 states and the District of Columbia, the difference in download speeds of the state with the fastest downloads and the state with the lowest is nearly a factor of 3. Downloading a file or a video in New Jersey rockets along at 24.1 megabits per second (Mbps) while downloads in Mississippi travel at a speed of just 8.8 Mbps.
In fact, 8 of the 10 states (including D.C.) with the fastest download speeds range from lower New England to Virginia. All exceed download speeds of 20 Mbps and only one state with a speed in that range (Ohio) is outside that eastern seaboard region.
The data were reported Friday by network monitoring firm OpenSignal based on testing conducted between July 1 and September 29 of this year.
The main reason for the concentration of high download speeds in one area of the country is population. Mobile network operators go where the people are and the states that have the highest speeds are those that have the most people. Some 50 million Americans live in a corridor running from Boston to Washington, D.C. and the entire area is highly urbanized. There are no large swaths of rural land in between urban population centers, making it easier for operators to provide consistent 4G/LTE service.
Here are the ten states with the fastest download speeds in the country:
- New Jersey: 24.1 Mbps
- Washington, D.C.: 23.6 Mbps
- Massachusetts: 22.4 Mbps
- Connecticut: 21.5 Mbps
- Delaware: 20.7 Mbps
- Ohio: 20.7 Mbps
- Maryland: 20.7 Mbps
- New York: 19.5 Mbps
- Pennsylvania: 19.3 Mbps
- Minnesota: 19.2 Mbps
See the Open Signal website for a complete listing of states ranked by download and upload speeds.
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