Last Updated: October 28, 2023, 14:38 IST
Railway stations in India get free public Wi-Fi service
RailTel started its public Wi-Fi with Google in India but now completely runs the operations across thousands of stations.
Free public Wi-Fi service at railway stations in India garners over 46 lakh GB of data consumption for RailTel, the company which manages the free public Wi-Fi services that are available at thousands of railway stations in India. We got these details from the company at the India Mobile Congress 2023 (IMC 2023) that is happening in Delhi from October 27 to October 29. In fact, RailTel is powering the Wi-Fi network for the public at the event.
This is a staggering figure and shows the power of free service that allows millions of people to access the internet at the railway stations. As you might be aware, the company worked with Google to set up Wi-Fi service at over 400 railway stations but after 2019, it has managed to get the number well above 6000 that are now completely managed, operated and run by the company.
If you browse through the RailTel website and see the number of stations covered by its free Wi-Fi service, you will see the expansion work has been impressive, especially when using public Wi-Fi networks are seen as a security concern by experts.
Most people know about RailTel through its Wi-Fi service that it started with Google. We were informed that Google mostly helped with the marketing and setting up exercise but RailTel has been the brainchild of the entire Wi-Fi operations at the railway stations.
To access the free internet, you just need to sign in with your mobile number on which you will get an OTP to start using the Wi-Fi service at the stations. The free Wi-Fi service is available for the first 30 minutes of usage every day at 1Mbps speed but you also have the option to try out the service at speeds up to 34Mbps by paying Rs 10 for a day or Rs 75 for one month.
We also enquired if RailTel plans to expand its public Wi-Fi service to further stations, to which, they didn’t give any clarity about their plans for the future.
