The world is huge

Don't miss any of it

Travel news, itineraries, and inspiration delivered straight to your inbox.

By proceeding, you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

X

Which Airports Have the Fastest Wi-Fi?

If you’re reading this post while waiting for your departure from Seattle, chances are it loaded quickly. That’s because Seattle-Tacoma International has the fastest airport Wi-Fi in the country, according to a new study by Speedtest.

“Seattle has now taken the crown of fastest airport Wi-Fi in North America from Denver, a strong contender that had held the title for two years running,” the study said. “Seattle’s also faster than our other global winners from last year including Gold Coast Airport in Australia, Congonhas-São Paulo Airport in Brazil, Dubai International, [and] Seoul Incheon International Airport in South Korea,” among others.

Here are the top 10 airports with the fastest Wi-Fi in North America:

  1. Seattle
  2. Denver
  3. Calgary
  4. Atlanta
  5. San Francisco
  6. Philadelphia
  7. Vancouver
  8. Boston
  9. Orlando
  10. New York (LaGuardia)

The five airports with the slowest Wi-Fi are Phoenix, Detroit, Minneapolis, Toronto (Pearson), and Montreal.

Picking Up Speed

Many airports also showed dramatic improvements in Wi-Fi speed over the past year. Atlanta clocked in with a pitiful download speed of 2.68 mbps (megabytes per second) in the 2017 survey. Forget streaming video and music, that’s barely fast enough for basic browsing. This year, however, download speeds increased to a robust 59.62 mbps.

Plenty of other airports improved their performance as well, signaling that airports realize how much travelers value this service. Seattle more than doubled its speed, as did Orlando and LaGuardia. Performance declined year-over-year at Detroit, Vancouver, Miami, and Dallas-Ft. Worth.

All data is based on Speedtest results from January through April 2018 on free Wi-Fi at each airport.

Readers, how important is airport Wi-Fi? Do you typically use the airport’s network while you’re at the gate?

Don't Miss a Trip, Tip, or Deal!

Let us do the legwork! Sign up for our free newsletter now.

By proceeding, you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

More from SmarterTravel:

We hand-pick everything we recommend and select items through testing and reviews. Some products are sent to us free of charge with no incentive to offer a favorable review. We offer our unbiased opinions and do not accept compensation to review products. All items are in stock and prices are accurate at the time of publication. If you buy something through our links, we may earn a commission.

Top Fares From