The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) recently released new test results on how well mobile networks were working across Mumbai, covering city roads, coastal stretches and local railway routes. They revealed that the country’s top three private telecom players, Jio, Airtel and Vi, were far ahead of the competition in both call quality and data performance.
The tests were carried out in November 2025, and the findings have now been shared with telecom operators for corrective action wherever needed, the telecom ministry confirmed in a statement.
TRAI conducted an Independent Drive Test (IDT) in the Mumbai Licensed Service Area over 320.km between November 3 and 7, 2025. This included 192.4km of city roads, 9.7km of coastal routes, 115km of local railway routes, seven hotspot locations and a 3.1km walk test.
The exercise was supervised by TRAI’s Regional Office in Bengaluru and used calibrated equipment and standard procedures.
Areas and networks covered
The assessment covered several dense neighbourhoods such as Navy Nagar, Colaba, Cuffe Parade, Byculla, Dadar, Dharavi, Kurla, Chembur, Ghatkopar, Bandra East, Wadala and many others.
Tests were also done at key points like CSMT and Ghatkopar railway stations, Saki Naka Metro, Kem Hospital in Sion Koliwada, and the Gateway of India–Karanja coastal stretch. The study measured performance on 2G, 3G, 4G and 5G networks, depending on what each operator offers.
TRAI checked call setup success rate (how often calls connect), call drop rate, call setup time, silent-call issues and voice quality (MOS score). In auto mode (5G/4G/3G/2G), Airtel, MTNL, Reliance Jio (RJIL) and Vodafone Idea (VIL) recorded call setup success rates of 99.62 per cent, 28.52 per cent, 99.81 per cent and 96.07 per cent respectively. Call drop rates were 0.00 per cent for Airtel, 22.47 per cent for MTNL, 0.56 per cent for Jio and 6.43 per cent for Vodafone Idea, while average voice quality scores (MOS) were 3.91, 2.67, 3.80 and 4.44, respectively, the TRAI noted.
Mobile data experience
For overall data performance, average download speeds were 221.34Mbps for Jio, 84.99Mbps for Airtel, 49.79Mbps for Vodafone Idea and 4.05Mbps for MTNL.
Upload speeds averaged 32.82Mbps (Jio), 25.86Mbps (Airtel), 18.94Mbps (Vodafone Idea) and 1.11Mbps (MTNL).
In hotspot locations, 5G speeds peaked at around 319.76Mbps download on Jio, 134.32Mbps on Airtel and 51.52Mbps on Vodafone Idea, while 4G and 5G were not seen on MTNL’s network, TRAI noted.
The test revealed that private players were largely delivering strong call connectivity and high 4G/5G data speeds in many parts of Mumbai, whereas MTNL’s network lagged on both call success and data speeds.