Latency 'a key issue' for mobile VoIP phones

Businesses thinking of investing in mobile VoIP phones may want to ensure their broadband connections have the correct characteristics.

A report from Ofcom into mobile broadband performance notes that headline speed is not always the defining factor in terms of the user experience.

Different connections can also experience different latency - the delay between sending an information request to the server and receiving the response data.

"In addition to increasing the time for web page downloads, high latency may make connections less suitable for some online games and VoIP," the report asserts.

For companies considering using mobile VoIP phones, a fixed-line broadband connection could help to reduce latency.

Meanwhile, as 4G mobile access begins to become commonplace, some performance concerns could fade away.

In a previous news release, Ofcom explained that the same range of the electromagnetic frequency spectrum can carry more than double the data by 4G that it can transmit using existing 3G technology.