29 Jun 2026
I’ve worked remotely for most of my career and, as a consequence, have developed the ability to get by on pitifully poor connections, carefully eking out every bit of bandwidth like the imperilled astronauts on Apollo 13 did with electricity.
It was only with the launch of 4G that working truly remotely, that is, via a mobile device from any location where there is a signal, became viable.
In the years since, I have probed the practical limits of digital nomadism, working from some incredible and far-flung places all over the world, including the forests of northern Russia, the fjords of New Zealand, the mountains of Nepal and the vestibule of a rickety night train winding its way through the Vietnamese jungle.
In the overwhelming majority of these places, I have been amazed by the quality of the network. And with each passing year and new location, returning to the realities of the UK network has become ever more depressing.
I currently live in a village in West Sussex, 60 or so miles from the centre of London. Certainly not up a mountain or in the middle of a desert. Other than a few nearby hills and some trees, the gently rolling landscape is typical of the English countryside.
However, the network in my area means I need two different contracts (EE and Vodafone) to use my phone (iPhone 15 Pro) at home (2nd-floor flat) and outdoors. When there is a stable signal, which is not that often, my general user experience is of dropped calls and creaky-slow data.
So after a promising start, what on earth (or in the heavens) happened to the UK’s network?
Ofcom’s Mobile Coverage Checker paints a very different picture from my lived experience. Entering my address puts me in the middle of a large, confidently purple block, one of many covering most of the UK, which is meant to mean “Good outdoor and in-home”. But my experience is not good. Far from it. It is characterised by paying sizeable sums for a service that increasingly struggles to deliver its most basic functions.
I recently trialled Starlink for the first time whilst trekking and was blown away by the quality of the connection. The book-sized antenna did require a clear-ish line of sight to the sky, but this was the only practical limitation for enjoying high-speed, stable mobile internet connectivity, pretty much anywhere. It is nothing short of a revolution.
That I was able to enjoy superior connectivity via satellite 4500m up a Himalayan mountain than via the long-established terrestrial network 60 miles from London remains a source of great bemusement.
I read that Starlink plans to launch a mobile service in the US. With AI pushing bandwidth demand in the UK ever higher, I very much hope they come to the UK too, and quickly. Aside from likely dramatic and immediate improvements, their disruptive presence may compel the incumbents to raise their lamentably lacklustre game.
Author: Benjamin Colchester
