India ranks 109th in mobile internet speed globally

India ranks 109th in mobile internet speed globally and 76th in fixed broadband speeds, according to Ookla's November edition of the Speedtest Global Index.

Notably, India's performance was poorer than its neighbors including Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka who registered better speeds than India. Norway was ranked first in the world for mobile internet, with an average download speed of 62.66 Mbps, as of November. Singapore led in the fixed broadband category, with a 153.85 Mbps average download speed.

Though the numbers do not make pretty reading for internet users in India, Ookla says there are visible improvements in mobile internet and broadband speeds. "Both mobile and fixed broadband internet in India are getting faster. That's good news for all Indian consumers no matter which operator or plan they use to access the internet," said Doug Suttles, general manager at Ookla. However, "India still has a long way to go to catch up with countries that have top speeds around the world," he added.

"At the start of 2017, the average mobile download speed in India was 7.65 Mbps (megabit per second). Heading to the end of the year, average mobile download speed is 8.80 Mbps as of November. That's a 15 percent increase," report said.

When it comes to fixed broadband speed, India ranked 76th globally and average speed in the country was better than Pakistan (ranked 126) and Nepal (rank 92). "Average fixed broadband download speed in January was 12.12 Mbps. As of November, it's at 18.82 Mbps, a close to 50 percent jump," the report said.

Ookla analyses the performance of the internet in every country based on consumer-initiated tests taken by real people using Speedtest. “Over 17 billion tests have been taken with Speedtest to date. From our observations in these markets, there are a handful of factors that consistently tend to drive advances in internet speeds and performance. These factors also apply to growth in India,” the statement said.