Deutschland: Netzabdeckung

Was die Zahlen zu Deutschland bedeuten

Zwei Zahlen zählen, und nur eine davon zitiert jeder Anbieter. Die typische Geschwindigkeit, 63 Mbit/s, sagt Ihnen, wie ein guter Moment aussieht.

Das zehnte Perzentil, 15 Mbit/s, ist die Zahl, die sich zu lesen lohnt. Es ist das Tempo im schlechtesten Zehntel des Tages, wenn die Zelle über dem Bahnhof voll ist und alle um Sie herum ebenfalls darin sind. Ein Land mit hohem Median und niedrigem Boden funktioniert wunderbar, bis zu dem Moment, in dem Sie es wirklich brauchen.

Wenn die Reise von Videoanrufen oder Hotspot abhängt, planen Sie mit dem Wert für volle Zeiten und nicht mit dem typischen.

Was in Deutschland passiert, wenn das Netz voll ist

Überlastung ist kein Fehler, sondern ein Dienstagabend. Die Frage ist, was Ihre eSIM dagegen tun kann, und bei den meisten Reise-eSIMs lautet die Antwort: nichts. Ein Großhandelsvertrag pro Land, ein Netz, und kein Ausweg außer, auf der Straße stehend, eine zweite eSIM bei jemand anderem zu kaufen.

Hier läuft der Orbislo-Verkehr über Telekom und Vodafone. Wenn das Netz, in dem Sie sind, schlechter wird, holen wir Sie mitten auf der Reise in ein anderes, ohne dass Sie fragen, und sagen es Ihnen hinterher, statt Sie im Moment zu unterbrechen.

Deutschland: Mobilfunkanbieter

• Telekom Deutschland: Telekom Deutschland won 130 MHz in Germany's 2019 5G auction, 2 x 20 MHz at 2 GHz and 90 MHz at 3.6 GHz, the joint largest holding with Vodafone. The auction ran from 19 March to 12 June 2019 over 497 rounds and raised 6,549,651,000 euros.
• Telefónica Germany: Telefónica Germany, which runs the O2 network, won 90 MHz in the 2019 auction, 2 x 10 MHz at 2 GHz and 70 MHz at 3.6 GHz.
• Vodafone: In the Bundesnetzagentur's figures for October 2025, Vodafone's 5G covered about 75 percent of Germany's land area, against about 87 percent for Telekom and 76 percent for Telefónica, each up about four points on a year earlier.
• 1&1: 1&1 has run Germany's fourth mobile network since December 2023, which it describes as Europe's first fully virtualised Open RAN network. Where it has no antennas of its own yet, its customers are carried automatically on Vodafone's network under a national roaming agreement.
• 1&1: Drillisch Netz, the 1&1 company that entered the 2019 auction as a newcomer, won 70 MHz: 2 x 10 MHz at 2 GHz and 50 MHz at 3.6 GHz.
• 1&1: 1&1 reported switching on a 5G network for public use in December 2022 but missed its obligation to have 1,000 5G base stations in service by the end of that year, citing delays, and said it would reach the target in 2023.
• 1&1: When the Bundesnetzagentur extended the 800, 1,800 and 2,600 MHz licences in 2025, it made national roaming for 1&1 a licence condition, required Telefónica to let 1&1 use 2,600 MHz spectrum for the extension period, and ordered the other operators to negotiate sharing frequencies below 1 GHz with 1&1 where it builds its own network.

Deutschland: ältere Netze

• Telekom switched its 3G network off across Germany on 30 June 2021 and moved the frequencies to 4G and 5G. By then its 4G reached 98.9 percent of German households.
• Vodafone began switching off its 3G network in the night of 30 June to 1 July 2021 and finished on the morning of 7 July. By then 3G carried less than 2 percent of its data traffic.
• Telefónica began its large scale 3G switch off on 1 July 2021 and moved the 2,100 MHz frequencies of about 16,000 3G transmitters to 4G by the end of that year.
• Telekom plans to switch its 2G network off completely by 30 June 2028 and reuse the 900 MHz band for 4G and 5G. Areas served only by 2G are due to get 4G or 5G first, and a phone that cannot call over VoLTE or 5G will stop working on Telekom after the switch off.
• Until then, at least one network still provides 2G across almost all of Germany, and about 97.5 percent of the land area has 4G from at least one operator, according to the Bundesnetzagentur's January 2025 figures.

Deutschland: 5G

• Vodafone switched all of its roughly 1,000 antennas in the 3.5 GHz band, in 170 towns and cities, to 5G standalone on 12 April 2021, connected to a separate 5G core, and opened it as Europe's first live standalone 5G network for private and business customers.
• About 95 percent of Germany's land area had 5G in October 2025, up from about 93 percent a year earlier, and around 98 percent had 4G or 5G. Building now concentrates on 5G standalone, with its own 5G core.
• Telekom has offered 5G since 2019. When it announced its 2G switch off, it said 5G already reached more than 97 percent of Germany's population and would reach 99 percent by the end of 2025.

Deutschland: Hinweise zum Netz

• The 2019 licences required each established operator to cover 98 percent of households in every federal state, all motorways, the most important federal roads and the busiest rail lines at 100 Mbit/s by the end of 2022, with 10 millisecond latency on motorways and federal roads, plus 1,000 5G base stations and 500 sites in areas with no coverage.
• By the January 2023 deadline all three established operators reported meeting the 98 percent household target, but some sites were still missing, especially in tunnels and along transport routes, which they blamed on permits, local opposition and nature protection.
• The 2019 award also required mobile broadband along every public rail line in Germany by the end of 2024, including lines not run by Deutsche Bahn.
• The 2025 licence extension requires at least 50 Mbit/s over 99.5 percent of Germany's land area from 2030, and 100 Mbit/s for 99 percent of households in sparsely populated municipalities in every state and along every federal road from 2029.
• The same decision requires at least 50 Mbit/s on state roads and core federal inland waterways from 2029 and on district roads from 2030, and obliges operators to negotiate with rail infrastructure companies over shared coverage along the tracks.