Also: Should you upgrade your Wi-Fi router to mesh? I tested it for a month, and here's my verdict Yes, cellular could provide faster service compared with Wi-Fi, according to the latest data from Speedtest provider Ookla. To conduct its research, Ookla analyzed Speedtest user data for median download speeds at 50 of the top US airports for the first half of 2025. The testing compared Wi-Fi coverage against that of mobile carriers AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon.
This year's newest iPhones included one momentous change that marked a new phase in the evolution of Apple Silicon: the Apple N1, Apple's first in-house chip made to handle local wireless connections. The N1 supports Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and the Thread smart home communication protocol, and it replaces the third-party wireless chips (mostly made by Broadcom) that Apple used in older iPhones.
Ookla has found that Apple's custom N1 networking chip that integrates the Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and Thread radios in the iPhone 17 family " delivers a clear step-change in real-world Wi-Fi performance " when compared to the Broadcom chip used in the iPhone 16 models. In North America, the iPhone 17 family also outperformed flagship Android phones when it came to Wi-Fi download speeds during the same time period.