T-Mobile Keeps 5G Standalone Lead as AT&T and Verizon Trail, Opensignal Finds

New network-performance data from analytics firm Opensignal shows T-Mobile holding a wide lead over AT&T and Verizon on 5G standalone (SA) availability, even as AT&T edges ahead on raw speed, according to coverage of the report by TmoNews and SammyGuru.

What the report measured

5G standalone, or 5G SA, is a network architecture that runs entirely on 5G infrastructure rather than borrowing parts of a carrier's existing 4G LTE core. It generally enables lower latency and supports more advanced network features than non-standalone 5G, which still relies on 4G signaling underneath.

Opensignal tracks how often real subscribers' phones are actually connected to each type of signal, rather than only measuring where a carrier claims coverage exists. The firm's October 2026 analysis, cited by TmoNews and SammyGuru, found T-Mobile users connected to 5G SA 71.2% of the time they used their phones, compared with 20.2% for Verizon customers and 4.4% for AT&T customers.

The numbers side by side

On latency, T-Mobile again came out on top at 40.2 milliseconds, just ahead of AT&T at 40.6 ms and Verizon at 42.9 ms, per TmoNews' summary of the report.

Where AT&T pulls ahead

AT&T recorded the fastest 5G SA speeds of the three carriers, with average download speeds of 344.7 Mbps and upload speeds of 22.6 Mbps, according to the TmoNews report. AT&T also led on Opensignal's Consistent Quality metric, a measure of how reliably a connection meets a quality threshold needed for everyday tasks like video calls, at 88.9%, ahead of Verizon's 86.4% and T-Mobile's 85.1%.

Opensignal noted that AT&T's faster speeds may partly reflect a smaller, less congested pool of SA users rather than a faster network overall, since only 4.4% of AT&T traffic runs on SA, TmoNews reported.

Why T-Mobile's lead persists

The gap traces back partly to when each carrier built out nationwide 5G SA service. T-Mobile began rolling out 5G SA in 2019 and said it completed nationwide SA coverage in April 2025, according to TmoNews. AT&T did not switch on a nationwide SA network until October 2025, about six months later, and Verizon's rollout also came after T-Mobile's, though TmoNews did not give an exact nationwide-launch date for Verizon.

A separate, broader Opensignal Mobile Network Experience report covering the period from September to November 2025 — reported by BroadbandBreakfast — found T-Mobile winning 12 of the awards it issues for categories such as 5G Coverage Experience (scoring 8.3 out of 10) and Reliability Experience. In that same report, AT&T led Overall Time on Network, with users connected to a mobile broadband signal 99.6% of the time, narrowly ahead of Verizon at 99.5% and T-Mobile at 99.1%; AT&T won one award in total, while Verizon won three awards, including 5G Video Experience and 5G Live Video Experience.

Two different Opensignal reports, two different pictures

Readers should note the two sets of figures come from different Opensignal studies measuring different things: the September–November 2025 report scores general network experience across many categories, while the newer analysis covered by TmoNews and SammyGuru focuses specifically on how often phones are actually locked onto a 5G standalone signal and how that signal performs.

What this means for consumers

Opensignal's own framing, as relayed by BroadbandBreakfast, is that the firm measures

For most everyday use, that distinction matters: a carrier with lower peak speeds but much higher SA availability, like T-Mobile, may deliver more consistent access to newer network features across more of the country, while AT&T's higher measured speeds currently apply to a much smaller share of its customers' connections.