In 2022, Celcom and Digi began talks to merge the two companies, that would eventually become CelcomDigi. Hoping to utilize the best of both telcos, initial signs indicated that there was some improvement but lately, quite a few CelcomDigi users from our Facebook page have said that it has become worse since their merger. On paper, pulling all the resources from both sides should make the mobile internet experience better but it became the opposite instead.
With that, we decided to ask a few of our CelcomDigi readers about their experience, the plan they are using, location and speed test screenshots. You can check out the images below on what they have to say (p.s. - A shoutout of thanks to those who contributed!).
According to You
Our findings
Many factors can affect a telco's mobile internet performance. Most of the time, rural areas just cannot get a good signal as they are out of range. We also have to consider mobile phones but out of all of these testimonies, there's not one good word about it.
Perhaps the most damning of all is from Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, with the overall speed being just pitiful even though they are on high-end plans (Digi Postpaid 150 Infinite and Celcom MEGA 128 Unlimited). This applies the same to one user in Sibu, Sarawak too. While the speed test looks good, the user's mobile experience says otherwise.
Elsewhere, other users with various CelcomDigi plans from prepaid to postpaid have terrible speeds as seen in the screenshots above. As mentioned, those with "good" speed test results often do not align with the users' mobile experience at all. Common criticisms include instability, slowness, and reduced speed. One particular comment caught our attention, such as having 4G+ signal strength before the merger but it went downhill after that (I recall having a 4G+ signal on my phone as well a few years back).
My Digi Postpaid 60's speed test on high-rise (left) and ground floor (right) in the same location
By the way, I'm also using Digi Postpaid 60 and most of the time, my plan's mobile speed is doable since I live around Old Klang Road, Kuala Lumpur. However, the signal bar strength often drops to level two when I travel to Bandar Kinrara, Puchong. Of course, it gets worse in high-rise apartments which will render 4G connectivity quite useless (even though the coverage map is good in my area), let alone 5G.
Conclusion - So what now?
So what can CelcomDigi users do about this? Well, opting out to another telco plan is one way but sometimes, they are just too expensive so there's no other choice but to stay subscribed. It's best to always check the coverage area before signing up for a particular plan through any telco's website. We can also report disappointing mobile data performance to our Malaysian government via this website here or call the hotline at 1-800-188-030.
It's been over a year since Celcom and Digi merged their business operations but I think the general consensus from our readers is that CelcomDigi's mobile data performance became worse than before. Perhaps they should have never merged at all. Maybe they need more time to streamline the data strength better but whatever the case is, CelcomDigi needs to do better than that and Malaysians are running out of patience.
We have reached out to CelcomDigi about this but we have yet to hear a response from them. But what do you think? Agree or agree to disagree? Share your thoughts in the comments below and stay tuned to TechNave.com for more detailed analysis like this.
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