The communications regulator (COMREG) in Ireland has rigorously tested all the mobile phones on the Irish market for call quality.
James and I visited their test labs here in Ireland to see how they are testing all these phones.
Here is the list of mobile phones with the best reception:
TRP = Total Radiated Power
The phone with the best reception is the Doro PhoneEasy with powers of 23dBm and 25.5dBm for GSM calls.
The Samsung Galaxy S8 is also excellent with 22.6 and 21.8dBm also.
The full set of results and details of how the tests were carried out are here.
How the tests were carried out.
They place the phone to be tested inside an anechoic chamber (see images above), on a platform that can be pivoted remotely .
They have a basestation head-end transmitter that can transmit GSM and UMTS at 900 and 2100Mhz.
This transmitter feeds the respective signal into the anechoic chamber, to an antenna which is located near the phone.
A call is made to the phone and the basestation handles this call.
The software rotates the phone 360DEG while at the same time monitoring the phones reception power.
Notice that a dummy hand is used to hold the phone. The type of hand you have and how you hold the phone has a big impact on your phone call reception or your data speeds.
Larger hands and clammy hands impact reception negatively. Also, the size of your head makes a difference.
This dummy hand used in these tests is made of a material that matches a human hand with respect to radio frequency absorption.
Each phone is tested in this rigorous environment and all the results have being collected.
Here is the COMREG PDF that explains the test procedure in more detail.
