Three 5G coverage checker

Last updated 11th July, 2023

Three 5G is available in parts of at least 588 towns and cities across the UK at the time of writing, covering at least 60% of the UK outdoors. That’s up from the 66 locations that it initially launched 5G in during late February of 2020.

This all followed a 5G home broadband launch in parts of London on 19th August 2019, and while Three was later to bring 5G to mobile than the other major networks, it hit the ground running with coverage in more places than most rivals.

It’s worth noting that some of the places with Three 5G won’t yet have complete coverage, but that’s set to improve over time. Three also plans on building the UK's fastest 5G network, based on the fact that it has the largest amount of 5G frequency spectrum of any of the UK's mobile operators.

Below we’ve detailed Three’s 5G network in full, including a list of the key places it’s available, and a comparison to the UK’s other 5G networks.

Three 5G Summary

How does Three's 5G coverage compare to others?

We’re tracking 120 major towns and cities in the UK for 5G coverage, and the four major 5G networks stack up as follows:

• O2 has launched 5G in 88 of the 120 locations below. 
• Three has launched 5G in 108 of the 120 locations below. 
• EE has launched 5G in 111 of the 120 locations below. 
• Vodafone has launched 5G in 82 of the 120 locations below. 

As noted above though, coverage isn’t yet comprehensive, so a tick against a location in the chart below just means a network has some 5G coverage there. As such, you should always use a network’s official coverage checker before buying a 5G plan.

Indoor and outdoor 5G coverage will also often differ – in other words, just because there’s outdoor 5G coverage, it doesn’t mean the signal will necessarily make it into buildings. But 5G coverage will get better over time, both inside and out.

Latest locations to get Three 5G

The most recent places that Three has brought 5G to (as of July 2023 include: Belfast, Cambridge, Croydon, Inverness, Kilmarnock, Paisley, Salisbury, Stockport and Torquay. 

Three coverage checker

Three's coverage checker shows 5G, 4G and 3G coverage in all places across the UK, broken down by indoor and outdoor coverage, so you should be able to get a clear picture of Three’s 5G coverage in your area, and it’s worth checking, because coverage isn’t comprehensive even in places that have some 5G.

Check Three 5G coverage

4G coverage

If you don’t have 5G in your area, then you will need to rely on 4G coverage. The good news with Three is that all its SIM plans are 5G ready at no extra cost, so when 5G does become available in your area you'll be able to access it without needing to pay extra or order a new SIM.

Three has around 99.8% UK population coverage with 4G. That’s largely comparable with rivals as you can see in the 4G coverage comparison below.

5G roaming abroad

Three doesn’t offer 5G roaming at the time of writing, but it’s not alone in that, as most networks don’t. That said, you can roam at 4G or 3G speeds at a low extra cost in 71 destinations, with select plans letting you roam for free.

5G network speeds

The most recent data we have on Three’s 5G speeds include an April 2023 Opensignal report which recorded an average 5G download speed of 237.7Mbps. That’s faster than any rival in the same report.

Similarly, RootMetrics in the second half of 2022 found that Three’s median 5G download speed was 202.8Mbps, which is also higher than any rival. The same report put its 95th percentile speed (so close to the max recorded) at 739.4Mbps, which is also higher than rivals, with its 5th percentile speed (so close to the lowest you’re likely to encounter) of 11.8Mbps only being beaten by EE.

There’s also a report from Ookla covering the first half of 2022, which recorded Three’s median 5G download speed as being 292.57Mbps. The report also found that Three was the UK’s fastest 5G network.

Going by September 2020 data from Point Topic, meanwhile, Three has an average UK 5G download speed of 158.7Mbps. The same tests found that its median 5G download speed was 122Mbps, and its maximum 5G download speed was 473Mbps – most of those speeds are UK-wide, but the maximum was recorded in Walsall. It’s worth noting that RootMetrics also recorded a maximum speed of 478.1Mbps in Liverpool – so that’s a similar but slightly higher result.

But given that Vodafone claims users could see peak speeds that exceed 1Gbps, Three’s network may be able to exceed 2Gbps. According to Three that's made possible due to the network having more ‘5G spectrum’ than its rivals and more importantly being the only mobile network with 100MHz of contiguous spectrum, which is the amount the ITU (the global standards body on 5G technology) state is required for ‘true’ 5G.

During the first half of 2021, RootMetrics additionally found that Three’s fastest ‘everyday 5G’ median download speed was 127.1Mbps. This was achieved using a mix of 5G-only and ‘5G mixed mode’ – a mode which switches between 5G and 4G during the same data activity, as users often will in the real world.

All of this is a massive boost on the operator's 4G download speeds, which according to data from Opensignal average 22.2Mbps, while peak real world 4G speeds on the network are unlikely to exceed 100Mbps most of the time.

Latency

Latency – measured in milliseconds (ms) - is how long the mobile network takes to respond to a request. A high latency can make things feel sluggish to respond even if download speeds are high, but the good news is that with 5G, latency could ultimately be as low as around 1ms. That’s compared to around 30-50ms on 4G, although according to 2021 Ookla data, Three’s 5G latency is 33ms, so potentially not much better currently than on 4G.

Three’s looks to be better than that in at least some places though, as a RootMetrics report found that in central London its 5G latency was just 17ms – which is far lower than rivals managed in the same tests.

Three’s 5G frequency allocation

Three currently uses 3.6-4GHz and 3.4GHz frequency spectrum for 5G, as the chart above shows. It’s this that carries the signal between masts and phones, and as you might have noticed, Three uses higher frequency spectrum for 5G than for 4G.

That’s because it’s available in greater capacity than lower frequency spectrum, which is necessary for connecting larger numbers of devices and dealing with greater data demands, while keeping speeds high and consistent.

That’s vital for 5G, but higher frequencies have drawbacks too, being shorter range and less effective at passing through buildings and other obstacles than lower frequencies like those Three uses for 4G.

However, some of those lower frequencies could be used to help improve these weaknesses of 5G networks too, with the 700MHz band (20MHz of which Three acquired at the second 5G spectrum auction) having been identified as a prime candidate for that.

In terms of Three’s 5G spectrum holdings, it has 140MHz in all, or 160MHz if you count the 700MHz spectrum that it might also use for 5G purposes. EE meanwhile has 80MHz (or 120MHz with the 700MHz band included), O2 has 80MHz / 100MHz, and Vodafone has 90MHz.

So Three has more 5G spectrum than any other UK network, as well as being the only one with 100MHz of contiguous 5G spectrum, which is an ideal amount for a 5G network

Looking ahead, Three and the other networks may at some point increase their 5G spectrum holdings too, as there may be additional spectrum auctioned off, such as some in the 26GHz and 8GHz bands.