Playing with Galaxus Mobile

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There is a chance that I have had the same Swisscom contract since 2003 or 2007 non-stop. In that time I have been very happy with network coverage. What I am less happy with is the price. At seventy or more francs for unlimited data it becomes very expensive on a yearly basis. Recently I noticed that I could get "unlimited data" for nineteen francs per month within Switzerland so I took a subscription in parallel to run some tests.

I ran these tests in Spain and Switzerland and found that although sometimes the signal is really bad, at other times it is excellent. Yesterday in between Signy and Borex I got 400 mbits per second down, and 100 up. In the centre of Borex I got just 20-40 mbits per second.

The best results I got were 405 Mbps down and 124Mbps up with a latency of 22ms whilst walking. I rarely do tests while just standing around.

One method of testing is for me to go for my daily walks and to stream from audiobookshelf to my phone and listen to audiobooks and podcasts. In so doing I notice that there is sometimes a lag between the moment I request a file to the moment it starts playing.

For 19 CHF per month you get unlimited data on the Swisscom network and for 39 CHF per month you get 20 gigabytes of data at full speed before being throttled.

You can switch between contracts to upgrade to the international option with ease, and downgrade as well. When you downgrade it occurs at the end of the current month. The international option is good when traveling around Europe.

And Finally

I wanted a contract that could be terminated within one month, that was cheaper than Swisscom, with unlimited data in Switzerland and a good option when traveling in Europe. Although network coverage is worse than Swisscom’s it has not got in the way of me using my mobile phone except when trying to use Passabene in coop at Signy Centre but that’s a minor inconvenience.

I have been waiting years for such a contract and now that it is here I can grab the opportunity. If I find that this was a mistake, in April, I can slide back to another option. I am only committed for one month at a time, rather than one year or two years at a time.

I mention April because Swisscom is still keeping me for another two months. It’s after these two months that I will find out whether I made a mistake. I feel confident that I did not.