5G speed nosedived but fixed with a VPN

[CPFC]

I have a ZTE 5G router for home broadband. Excellent signal. Normally 250-300Mbps with occasional dips below 100Mbps in peak times.

The last week my 5G has dropped to 10Mbps or less. I've been on to support and they say, no issues with the mast. They take me through troubleshooting and no issues at my end either. 

This morning I thought I wonder if I put a VPN on will it make a difference and I was amazed, back to normal speeds. Trouble is I've only got the VPN on my laptop and can't find a way to add it to my smart TV for streaming which is where 10Mbps second really shows. .

Can any of you more techie people can explain why Three 5G has dropped to under 10Mbps for a week but everything is back to normal with a VPN? Thanks 

[Nick_London]

It maybe trafficsense in operation, during times where there is lot of demand they divert some of the capacity elsewhere. Its a bit like throttling.

What I can say is that Three will be switching off 3G through 2024 and this will release a lot of capacity for 5G.  So if I am correct about demand, you should experience less of this when 3G is turned off.

Also have you updated your phones software, I had this issue on O2 once and using mobile hotspot, the device sharing my data has a much better speed. Once I updated my phones software it stopped doing that.