Google reveals which telco has the best YouTube experience in Malaysia

With faster 4G connectivity and more data for video streaming, you must be wondering which telco in Malaysia has the best video streaming experience. To find out, Google Malaysia has announced a new YouTube Video Checkup tool that ranks each telco by its streaming quality.

By analysing billions of watch viewing results each month, YouTube is able to provide a score for each telco at their respective locations. The scores are based on the telco’s capability in streaming SD and HD content through the YouTube mobile app in the past 35 days.

Each provider can be given up to 5 stars with an incremental of 0.5 stars. At the moment, a telco can only achieve a maximum of 4.0 stars as 4.5/5.0 are reserved for future use such as VR and 360-degree videos. With this new feature, it will not only help the public to track their telco performance but it could also assist telcos in identifying areas that require network optimisation.

From the current results, both Celcom and Maxis scored the highest at 4.0 stars in the Klang Valley.

Meanwhile, in the Sabah and Sarawak as a whole, Maxis takes the lead as the only operator with 4.0 stars.

According to its methodology page, they are getting measurements only from 4G LTE-enabled device that had successful connected to an LTE network. Therefore, the scoring excludes legacy non-LTE device to give a clearer representation of an actual experience with a modern smartphone and plan. LTE phone users that switched to 3G due to limited coverage are included in the rating as well.

Google has also shared that YouTube is being watched 2 out of 3 times from a mobile device in Malaysia, These numbers are set to grow as mobile usage enjoyed an annual growth of 84% from the previous year. In short, more people are streaming YouTube from their smartphones and this is driven by the increase of high-speed network coverage in the country.

To address privacy concerns, Google assures that data collected for this checkup are anonymised and no personal information is collected or stored for this exercise. Unfortunately, the YouTube Video Checkup feature currently covers our the 4 Malaysian telcos as Webe and Yes are not included in the list. According to the site, the results may vary depending on device, location and data plan. Some other factors may include data throttling and relationships with MVNOs. It’s also worth mentioning that Malaysia is the first and only country to have this new video checkup feature.

Find out which telco has the best YouTube streaming quality in your area over here.