Verizon continued its winning streak on the national level in RootMetrics’ performance report for the first half of 2017, but the firm noted a nuanced picture of the changing carrier landscape can be seen in the city and state level results.
By RootMetrics’ measure, Verizon scored outright national level wins in five of its six categories, including Overall, Reliability, Speed, Data, and Call. However, the carrier was blocked from a shutout by rivals AT&T and Sprint, which achieved a statistical three-way tie for first place in the Text category.
But Verizon’s longstanding dominance on the national level belies a more complicated picture on the state and metro levels. On those counts, RootMetrics noted Verizon actually lost ground. At the state level, Verizon won or shared 268 awards (out of a possible 300), marking a decrease of 10 awards from the report for the second half of 2016. Similarly, Verizon’s metro winnings dropped from 658 in the second half of last year to 617 in the most recent period.
AT&T proved to be the primary beneficiary of Verizon’s slide, raising its state level count from 92 awards in the last report to 140 in this latest one. The carrier also added to its metro level tally, jumping from 372 in the 2H 2016 report to 396 in the 1H 2017 metrics. T-Mobile also increased its state level count from 13 awards previously to 21 in the first half of this year.
RootMetrics pointed out AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile all made progress on data speed and reliability on the metro level this go around, with T-Mobile also boosting speed on the state level. On the metro measure, T-Mobile won or shared 58 awards, compared to 74 for Verizon, 29 for AT&T, and 4 for Sprint.

Credit: RootMetrics
Those speed gains have yet to show up as solid gains on the state and national levels for T-Mobile, but RootMetrics said that could change as the Un-carrier expands its footprint further with its new 600 MHz spectrum.
“T-Mobile has long been known for delivering fast speeds and strong reliability in our metro area testing. However, T-Mobile’s success at the metro level has yet to translate into notable improvements in our state or national testing,” RootMetrics said in its report. “But with an LTE footprint that continues to expand and mature in metro areas, T-Mobile could make an impact at the state and national levels if the network’s LTE coverage gains traction outside of metropolitan markets.”
RootMetrics’ full report can be found here.