If speed matters to you when it comes to smartphones, you have to consider several aspects when picking your next device, whether it’s an iPhone or Android phone. While a phone’s processor and RAM are important, a new study also claims you should be paying attention to just how good the Wi-Fi chip is, as there could be more tangible benefits there than you might expect.

Research from Ookla claims Apple’s new iPhone 17 phones have a “substantial upgrade” with their Apple-made N1 Wi-Fi chip compared to the version used in the iPhone 16 range, which were manufactured by partner Broadcom.

Ookla, which owns the popular Speedtest app for monitoring Wi-Fi network speeds, used global crowdsourced data over a period of six weeks to analyse the Wi-Fi performance on the iPhone 17 compared to older iPhones and a range of Android phones.

“The iPhone 17 family delivers a clear step-change in Wi-Fi performance vs. the Broadcom-based iPhone 16 lineup, with faster download and upload speeds across every region,” Ookla’s Luke Kehoe said. “Globally, median download and upload speeds on the N1 were each up to 40 percent higher than on its predecessor.”

Though there are similarities in the specs between the iPhone 16 and iPhone 17’s Wi-Fi hardware, Ookla noticed a “clear step change” in performance.

The below graph shows that between September 19 and October 29, 2025, the iPhone 17 phones consistently outperformed the iPhone 16 for Wi-Fi speeds across the globe:

“New devices often appear to outperform in their early weeks, partly because early adopters skew toward wealthier markets with more capable Wi-Fi networks,” Kehoe said. “However, the consistency and magnitude of the iPhone 17’s lead indicate this is not a launch-period skew but a genuine improvement.”

Apple says the N1 chip is “a new Apple-designed wireless networking chip that enables Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and Thread”, the latter of which is a smart home connectivity standard. The N1 is also said to improve the performance and reliability of the iPhone 17’s hotspot and AirDrop features.

Despite the gains, the research said Google’s Pixel 10 Pro recorded the highest global median download speeds, just beating the iPhone 17 family with a score of 335.33 Mbps compared to the iPhone’s 329.56 Mbps.

Samsung’s popular Galaxy S25 range did not perform as well as expected, pipped to third place globally behind the Xiaomi 15T Pro, a phone I reviewed favourably recently.

The £649 phone costs less than the £799 iPhone 17 and £799 Samsung Galaxy S25 but scored the highest global upload speed of 129.22 Mbps, with the iPhone 17 series second with 103.26 Mbps.

The phone uses Wi-Fi silicon integrated into its MediaTek Dimensity 9400+ chip.