Brazil coverage

What the Brazil numbers mean

Two numbers matter and only one of them is the one every seller quotes. The typical speed, 49 Mbps, tells you what a good moment looks like.

The tenth percentile, 12 Mbps, is the one that matters. It is the speed in the worst tenth of the day, when the cell above the station is full and everybody around you is on it too. A country with a high median and a low floor is a country that works beautifully right up until the moment you actually need it.

If the trip depends on video calls or tethering, plan around the busy figure rather than the typical one.

What happens in Brazil when the network is busy

Congestion is not a fault, it is a Tuesday evening. The question is what your eSIM can do about it, and for most travel eSIMs the answer is nothing: one wholesale agreement per country, one network, and no way out except buying a second eSIM from somebody else while standing in the street.

Here, Orbislo traffic runs over Vivo and Claro. When the network you are on degrades we move you to another one, mid trip, without you asking, and tell you afterwards rather than interrupting you at the time.

Mobile operators in Brazil

• Vivo: Vivo held 38.1 percent of Brazil's mobile accesses in Anatel's figures for late 2025, ahead of Claro on 33.1 percent and TIM on 23.1 percent, with every other operator together on 5.7 percent.
• Vivo: In the November 2021 5G auction Telefônica Brasil paid R$420 million for a nationwide 80 MHz block between 3.3 and 3.7 GHz, the dearest of the three national blocks, and added a national 20 MHz block and three nationwide 200 MHz blocks at 26 GHz.
• Claro: Claro won a nationwide 80 MHz block in the 3.3 to 3.7 GHz range for R$338 million in November 2021, plus an extra national 20 MHz block for about R$80.3 million and two nationwide 200 MHz blocks at 26 GHz.
• TIM: TIM paid R$351 million for its nationwide 80 MHz block in the 3.3 to 3.7 GHz range in November 2021, about R$80.3 million for a further national 20 MHz block, and R$27 million for a nationwide 200 MHz block at 26 GHz.
• Brisanet: Brisanet won two regional 80 MHz blocks in the 3.3 to 3.7 GHz range in 2021. One cost R$1.25 billion, a premium of 13,741 percent over the minimum price, and the other R$105 million.
• Winity: Winity II Telecom won the 700 MHz block on offer in 2021, 708 to 718 MHz paired with 763 to 773 MHz, bidding R$1.43 billion, 805.84 percent above the minimum price.
• Algar Telecom: Algar Telecom took the regional 80 MHz 3.5 GHz block for one regional service area in 2021 for R$2.35 million, plus 2.3 GHz spectrum there for R$57 million and five of that area's 200 MHz blocks at 26 GHz.
• MVNOs: Virtual operators running on the big networks ended 2025 with 9.5 million lines, 34 percent more than a year earlier but only 3.5 percent of all mobile accesses. Datora held 36 percent of those lines and Surf 31 percent.

Older networks in Brazil

• Since 6 April 2025 Anatel no longer certifies mobile phones that work only on 3G or older technology, so every newly approved model supports at least 4G. Models certified earlier as 3G only may keep their certification.
• Phones certified from 6 April 2025 must support, with the feature switched on, voice calls over 4G (VoLTE), including emergency calls, and text messages over IMS, so their calls do not depend on 2G or 3G.

5G in Brazil

• Anatel has counted 5G lines since August 2021, when a 5G version sharing existing spectrum, known as 5G DSS, was already available in parts of the country along with compatible handsets.
• Under the 2021 auction rules, operators could start using the 3.3 to 3.7 GHz band from 30 June 2022 in state capitals and the Federal District, then in stages by city size, with 1 January 2026 set for all remaining municipalities.
• Each national 3.5 GHz winner must build 5G NR Release 16 stations on a contiguous carrier of at least 50 MHz, starting at one station per 100,000 residents in state capitals by 31 July 2022 and reaching one per 15,000 in every municipality above 30,000 people by 31 July 2029.
• The national 3.5 GHz winners also had to pay for moving free to air satellite TV reception from the C band to the Ku band, and for clearing 3,625 to 3,700 MHz of the satellite services that used it.

Network notes for Brazil

• Brazil had about 270.3 million mobile accesses in Anatel's figures for late 2025. Postpaid lines made up 64.7 percent of them against 35.3 percent prepaid. In 2018 prepaid had still been the majority, at 56.5 percent.
• The sale of Oi's mobile business in 2022 divided its customers among Vivo, Claro and TIM, cutting Brazil from four large mobile groups to three and sharply raising market concentration.
• The 700 MHz licence carries a duty to bring 4G to stretches of federal highway that had none: 10 percent by the end of 2023, 50 percent by the end of 2025, 90 percent by the end of 2027 and all of them by 31 December 2028.
• On highways and in places covered under these auction duties, the licence holder must also carry voice and data for customers of other Brazilian operators that have no service of their own there.
• Holders of 2.3 GHz spectrum had to bring 4G to all their assigned municipalities under 30,000 people by the end of 2024, a town counting as covered once a signal of at least minus 110 dBm reaches 95 percent of its urban area.
• The same licences oblige 4G at LTE Advanced standard or better in villages that lacked it, all assigned villages by 31 December 2028, each served by at least one base station inside the village with 50 Mbps of backhaul.