04.01.2022
New Year's Eve 2021/22:O2 network starts with data fireworks into 2022
Data fireworks on New Year's Eve: customers send more mobile data through the O2 network than ever before
The year 2022 starts directly with data fireworks at O2 / Telefónica Deutschland: In the first hour of the new year, customers sent more mobile data through the O2 network than ever before on New Year's Eve, with around 382,000 gigabytes. This represents an increase of 35 percent compared with the prior-year period (283,000 GB data volume). Traditionally, customers send many congratulations via instant messaging apps such as WhatsApp or via social media channels such as Instagram and Facebook, especially in the first hour of the new year. With a total of 13.5 million phone calls, more calls were also made in the hour after midnight than in the previous year.
Overall, customers sent more than 13.5 million gigabytes of mobile data through the O2 network on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day (31 December and 1 January). This also represents an increase of 35 percent compared with the previous year (around 9.2 million GB). Data usage on the mobile network has been increasing rapidly for years, including on New Year's Eve. By way of comparison, five years ago - at the turn of the year 2016/17 - the figure was 1.5 million gigabytes within those two days.
Number of New Year's greetings by phone increases
O2 also recorded an increase in the number of calls made via the mobile network: In the period from 0 to 1 a.m., customers made a total of 13.5 million calls - more than in the previous year (12.1 million calls). In total, they talked for 19.2 million minutes (previous year: 19.8 million minutes). Customers traditionally keep their New Year's greetings short at this time of year. On average, calls lasted just under one and a half minutes.
On New Year's Eve and New Year's Day, customers made a total of over 200 million calls (previous year: 173 million) with a total duration of around 503 million minutes (previous year: 534 million).
Significantly more data usage in major cities
Busy on the O2 network: data usage increased significantly in major cities on New Year's Eve
In the first hour of the new year, customers in major cities in particular kept the O2 network busy: In the capital Berlin, data usage took on new dimensions with around 30,500 GB (previous year: 23,000 GB). The other top spots were taken by Hamburg with 12,400 GB (previous year: 9,300 GB), Munich with 8,500 GB (previous year: 6,300 GB), Cologne with 7,300 GB (previous year: 5,200 GB), Frankfurt with 5,300 GB (previous year: 3,700 GB), Düsseldorf with 4,600 GB (previous year: 3,200 GB), Dortmund with 4,200 GB (previous year: 3,300 GB), Duisburg with 4,000 GB (previous year: 3,000 GB), Essen with 3,900 GB (previous year: 3,100 GB) and Hanover with 3,900 GB (2,900 GB).
Surprisingly, the highest increase in mobile data volume was recorded by the city of Constance. Here, customers sent twice as much data through the O2 network as in the prior-year period. Data usage also increased particularly strongly in cities such as Würzburg (+64 percent) and Erfurt (+60 percent).
Ambitious expansion plans: 5G for half the population by the end of 2022
O2 is consistently expanding its mobile network so that millions of people can reliably connect with each other throughout the year. The focus is on 5G network expansion: last year O2 fired up the 5G expansion turbo in 2021. O2 already reaches around 30 percent of the population in Germany with the latest mobile communications generation. What makes this special is that O2 is placing a strong focus on using the 3.6 GHz frequencies in its 5G network, which are suitable for particularly fast and powerful 5G and thus offer customers a better network experience. With around 4,400 5G antennas, no other German network has so many 5G antennas transmitting at 3.6 GHz. But that is not all: O2 is pushing ahead with its 2022 expansion campaign and aims to provide half of the German population with 5G by the end of the year - and the whole of Germany by 2025.
In addition, O2 is also expanding its 4G network and closing the last gaps in coverage. To enable even more customers to benefit from higher surfing speeds in parallel, O2 switched off its 3G network at the end of 2021 and is using the freed-up frequencies for the significantly faster and more efficient 4G network.