iPhone 12 mini WiFi is slower on an iPhone than an Android, Why?

[Macman123456]

I'm posting this question here with my Mac officianados instead of out in the computer wilderness to save the usual razzing from the other guys picking on the iPhone. That being said I was working with a neighbor friend who is a Purple Heart vet from Vietnam fixing his home Wifi. Once we got everything set up we tested his connection from Xfinity and on his wired network he was getting the 400M he was paying for. Then when we tested his Wifi on his older Android he was getting the 400M too. This shocked me since I've never received that on my iPhone. So I hooked up to his Wifi with my iPhone 12 mini and mine never broke 200M. He has the Eero Pro 6 with Wifi 6 or Wifi AX. I have the same Wifi at my house too and I get similar slower results with 1 gig service. I know many of you would kill to have that kind of speed so I don't mean to be speedy greedy but can anyone explain why Androids are so much faster? Is this a setting on my iPhone that I'm missing?

Thanks,

David

 

[ian87w]

It could be that your iPhone is connecting with 2.4GHz band instead of 5GHz. See if that's the case. If you want to make sure, try separating the 2.4GHz and 5GHz into 2 separate SSID and see if there are any differences.

 

[Spetsgruppa]

For me wifi is faster on IOS.

 

[Significant1]

My old Android also usual do a bit better than my 12 pro. But the 12 pro can still get around 600+ mbps, where the signal is strongest and is better than my m1 MacBook air I just reviewed, which barely exceeded 500mbps (970mbps when plugging in Ethernet)

 

[now i see it]

Both of my android devices have much better connectivity to everything. I didn't realize how 2nd-class-citizen iOS devices are compared to Android (Thanks to Qualcomm) when it comes to wifi/cell.

But

All my iPhone's have superior Bluetooth performance compared to android

 

[Steven-iphone]

Could be cell phone radios / attenna's

 

[LFC2020]

As Steve would say, You're using the WiFi wrong. ??

 

[Ram65]

It’s the antenna apple uses nothing you can do . Android usually fair better in this area than apple .

 

[ericwn]

Might be having a firmware update available on the router side?

 

[JasonHB]

It’s the antenna apple uses nothing you can do . Android usually fair better in this area than apple .

Rubbish, I get between 400 and 600Mbps on my WiFi at home with my 12 Pro Max

 

[Macman123456]

It could be that your iPhone is connecting with 2.4GHz band instead of 5GHz. See if that's the case. If you want to make sure, try separating the 2.4GHz and 5GHz into 2 separate SSID and see if there are any differences.

Well the Eero Wifi doesn't allow 2 separate modes. The router I guess picks the best for the connected device.

 

[Macman123456]

Could be cell phone radios / attenna's

Well not sure if that's the case as the phones are right next to the Wifi.

 

[Macman123456]

Might be having a firmware update available on the router side?

The router software is up to date.

 

[ian87w]

Well the Eero Wifi doesn't allow 2 separate modes. The router I guess picks the best for the connected device.

You can check on the router settings to see which band your iPhone connected to. Some routers will show it but other don't, so YMMV.

Some routers might be finicky with some devices as well, especially if both comes/set for different regions. I have had some routers with poorer performance than expected because for some reason it is not able to utilize higher channels for better bandwidth (the router is China region). OTOH, I have had some of my devices unable to connect to a router because the router used a channel outside my devices' region (the router was US region).

So there are many possibilities of explanations.

 

[Macman123456]

Well I checked and my phone is connected to the 5 GHz connection of the router...still hovering around 150. I know this is very fast and I can do most anything with that speed. It's just a thing bugging me not liking Android. Steve Jobs quote paraphrasing...Android is grand theft auto. RIP Steve.

 

[secretk]

It’s the antenna apple uses nothing you can do . Android usually fair better in this area than apple .

Yep, seems like it. I have not done such test myself so that's interesting that you picked up such huge difference.

 

[thatsthequy]

I would bet your neighbours older Android phone has a Wi-Fi 5 chip in it, unlike the Wi-Fi 6 in your iPhone 12 mini. What is likely happening here is when you run the speedtest on your phone, the TCP Congestion Window is not expanding quickly enough for you to see higher .11ax data rates on your phone. This is a known limitation of speedtest servers right now, since they are usually so short. If you ran a local iperf test for 30s or longer, you could actually watch that Congestion Window expand.

His Wi-Fi 5 device doesn't utilize the new Wi-Fi 6 magic, so it is able to hit 400Mbps a bit sooner than you would be able to expand to >600Mbps.

If you downloaded a large app, or a couple of concurrent iTunes movies, you'd see the speeds you expect.

 

[Macman123456]

I would bet your neighbours older Android phone has a Wi-Fi 5 chip in it, unlike the Wi-Fi 6 in your iPhone 12 mini. What is likely happening here is when you run the speedtest on your phone, the TCP Congestion Window is not expanding quickly enough for you to see higher .11ax data rates on your phone. This is a known limitation of speedtest servers right now, since they are usually so short. If you ran a local iperf test for 30s or longer, you could actually watch that Congestion Window expand.

His Wi-Fi 5 device doesn't utilize the new Wi-Fi 6 magic, so it is able to hit 400Mbps a bit sooner than you would be able to expand to >600Mbps.

If you downloaded a large app, or a couple of concurrent iTunes movies, you'd see the speeds you expect.

Very interesting. Thanks for the reply. David

 

[Tsepz]

Well I checked and my phone is connected to the 5 GHz connection of the router...still hovering around 150. I know this is very fast and I can do most anything with that speed. It's just a thing bugging me not liking Android. Steve Jobs quote paraphrasing...Android is grand theft auto. RIP Steve.

Very odd, but I also see this with my 11 Pro Max versus my Huawei P40 Pro and a Mate 40 Pro as well as Samsung Galaxy Note8.

I have noticed that the iPhone and Samsung tend to also lose connection easier with WiFi versus the Huaweis which seem to have much stronger signal for everything, this includes 4G LTE to, not just WiFi.

I put it down to the fact that some android manufacturers like Huawei, Motorola and Nokia have access to their networking businesses and so their engineers may just be better at laying out the antennas on the devices, and maybe they have better algorithms at managing speed and frequency that may be patented. Who the hell knows though.

What Android does your neighbor use?

 

[Macman123456]

I know it's a weird situation. My neighbor has a Samsung Note that is not the latest maybe one or two generations old.

 

[secretk]

I put it down to the fact that some android manufacturers like Huawei, Motorola and Nokia have access to their networking businesses and so their engineers may just be better at laying out the antennas on the devices, and maybe they have better algorithms at managing speed and frequency that may be patented. Who the hell knows though.

The weird thing is that with my Android phones I was never aware where those antennas were. This is not a topic that is brought up in relation to Android devices. It just works. I was wondering is it also possible that for some reason Java (Android) has better implementation when it comes to network connection compared to Swift (iOS)?

 

[Vegas33139]

There's a known issue with Wi-Fi and certain IP12's. The fix has been confirmed in the up and coming 14.5 ios update.

 

[Macman123456]

Huh. OK I'll try it again when the update comes out.

 

[jcorbin]

I’ve seen reports of the mini having slower speeds than the rest of the 12s

 

[Tsepz]

The weird thing is that with my Android phones I was never aware where those antennas were. This is not a topic that is brought up in relation to Android devices. It just works. I was wondering is it also possible that for some reason Java (Android) has better implementation when it comes to network connection compared to Swift (iOS)?

Haha, I see what you did there! “It just works”

Could very well be down to OS! I am not at all a developer or nor do I know a lot about how the two OSs work fundamentally at their core with networking, but this question is something I do ask my self sometimes about iOS, especially when it comes to how it deals with networks both WiFi and Mobile Networks.
I remember going back to the late 2000s comparing my Dads iPhone 3G to the Nokia E90 and N81 I had at the time and wondering why the iPhone would be weaker in network and WiFi performance but I figured back then that the iPhone was still new and design may not be optimal, but over a decade later and these things are still happening.

Maybe Apple limit the amount of power supplied to the modems to ensure there is a good battery life balance?

Hopefully iOS 14.5 clears this particular issue up for the 12 Mini.

With the above said I still get great signal and data speeds with my iPhone, but yes, when I sit and compare it to other devices that’s when I begin to notice that it’s not the best in this area at all. Hope Apple will figure this out one day, it’s something I also picked up with some Samsung’s, their smartphones don’t have the greatest signal performance in my experience to, Nokia, Huawei and Motorola have always been incredible for me and coincidentally they all have Networking units, although Nokia as it stands today is licensed by HMD.