Vodafone UK Launch 5G Home Broadband with Claim of Full-Fibre‑Like Speeds
Mobile operator Vodafone (VodafoneThree) has this morning announced a “major expansion of its home broadband offering” by launching Vodafone 5G Broadband and claiming to open up “full‑fibre like speeds” to a further 3.7 million homes across the UK. The focus seems to be on those homes still stuck on “slow, unreliable speeds offered by part-fibre or copper” connections.
At this point it’s worth mentioning that Vodafone has had a 5G based home broadband service for a while, although until now it’s tended to sit more in the background. But we suspect the recent merger with Three UK, which has long had a much more active 4G and 5G based “Home Broadband” service, may have helped encourage a change. Indeed, the merger deal does mention a clear target for fixed wireless broadband coverage.
The refreshed service, which is being promoted alongside “speeds of up to 150Mbps – 3 x faster than a typical part-fibre connection – and unlimited data on every plan“, is also said to be offering instant set-up (no need for an engineer visit) and no upfront costs with rolling 30-day plans or 24-month terms.
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Prices start at £21 a month on a 24-month plan for up to 50Mbps or £22 if you want up to 150Mbps, but it’ll be £30 a month on a 30-day rolling plan for up to 50Mbps or £32 for up to 150Mbps. Existing Vodafone mobile customers will also receive a £2 a month saving through Vodafone Together, which offers discounts when mobile and broadband are bundled.
Launching alongside Vodafone 5G Broadband is a new integrated availability checker on Vodafone.co.uk, designed to make choosing the right connection much easier. Customers simply enter their postcode and are shown whether full fibre or 5G Broadband will give them the fastest speeds in their area. “By bringing both options into a single, streamlined journey, Vodafone gives customers more confidence to choose the connectivity that best suits their needs,” said the announcement.
Combined with Vodafone’s existing full fibre footprint of 23.2 million UK homes (this reflects FTTP networks from Openreach, CityFibre and CommunityFibre) – the provider said they now offer “powerful broadband to more households than anyone else“.
Rob Winterschladen, Consumer Director at VodafoneThree, said:
“Millions of households are still paying over the odds for unreliable and slow broadband that often only reaches 74Mbps. With Vodafone 5G Broadband, we’re giving those homes a genuinely fast alternative, at great value, with no installation, no waiting and no hassle.
As the UK’s largest full fibre provider, we already bring fast, reliable broadband to more homes than anyone else – and by adding 5G Broadband, we can now reach millions more. This launch is about giving customers real choice: full fibre where it’s available, and powerful 5G Broadband where it’s not – plus, better options for anyone wanting speed with ease and flexibility”.
For homes where the outdoor 5G signal is stronger than indoors, Vodafone will “soon launch” an Outdoor Hub to provide an extra boost (no doubt also influenced by Three Broadband’s Outdoor Hub option). The outdoor hub will require self-installation outside the property, where it will lock on to the strongest 5G signal available in the area and connect directly to the indoor Power Hub router.
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The catch with a 5G based service is that the broadband performance will be quite variable between locations, which is where we start to take issue with how Vodafone are promoting this service as being able to offer “full‑fibre like speeds“. At present, it’s increasingly common for FTTP providers to offer much more stable speeds of up to 2-5Gbps and a few are even doing into 7-10Gbps territory. No doubt Vodafone can deliver faster 5G speeds than they advertise too, but full fibre is operating on another level to this.
The other catch to watch out for, because it existed with Three’s Home Broadband service too, is that national UK availability can be quite variable. Sometimes you’ll want it and find they won’t offer the service, which is due to various reasons, such as insufficient local capacity etc.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
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Despite having Vodafone and Three 5G in my area the checker tells me it isn’t in my area yet. Seems to be picky.
Nice to see a one-month option which could be a stop-gap for some people.
The price rises on the 24 month plans are a little extortionate at 16% per annum!
Basically just a more expensive with additional speeds caps version of 3s 5g offering. 3 have also offered a one month option for years
The price is absurd—you could get Starlink for £25 a month with 100 Mbps, YouFibre for £30 a month, if your in a fibre area or even better, an iD Mobile SIM-only plan for £15 and pair it with a 4G/5G router from eBay. Vodafone really knows how to milk its customers.
Starlink would be a no-go for renters and/or those who live in a flat (and don’t forget the cost of powering the thing). If you can get any kind of FTTP (let alone from some tiny niche altnet) then you aren’t the target market for this.
If you want to pay £xxx for a 5G router and mess about with phone SIMs by using them in ways not intended by their supplier then that is up to you, but others just want something that they can plug in and go.
I would however question how many premises are in a situation where FTTP is unavailable yet Vodafone 5G is. Certainly not 3.7 million, even including rentals in FTTP areas where the landlord won’t give permission for an install.
starlink is £35pm for 100mb ( the 6 month £25 promo ended at end of april ) and currently people are waiting 3+ weeks for the starlink dish to be delivered due to the promo
Also worth pointing out Starlink runs on 12v so it’s power consumption is not, or shouldn’t be enough to cause anyone concern – unless they are a tin hat —-
It’s a good system – it’s my backup should Youfibre go down
Simon – Starlink themselves claim the “average” consumption is anywhere from 75-150W depending on model. 20W at idle, which is still higher than the average fixed line router running at load. No tinfoil hattery needed. Not including the mini as I assume that is not the unit they supply on these plans. I presume 150W is in an extreme case when the snow/ice heater is on.
https://starlink.com/gb/support/article/18836c7e-2d97-6153-fe67-c18427bd0558
5G broadband seems very susceptible to congestion on the network, my sister has it with 3 and sometimes it’s fine but at peak times it’s terrible especially on the uplink when they are trying to video call us.
I am using Lebara mobile SIM card in my 5G router, Lebara is using the Vodafone network anyway, just cost £25 for monthly unlimited plan, speed ok with 200 GB which is enough for me.
I bought a Three 5G router off ebay a few years ago for £115. I just use a Smarty unlimited sim in it, that cost me £15 a month. No annual price rises either..
They were selling 5G broadband 2 years ago under the Vodafone brand with unlimited usage and 5G router supplied for a whopping £70 per month. Three have been offering this for some time at much reasonable rates, given Three is now under the Vodafone umbrella they cannot really call it new. But Vodafone definitely was selling this for £70 per month offering the equivalent of what they are offering now as home broadband. They were also selling this at a discounted rate for people who tried to buy Vodafone home broadband that fell out of full fibre coverage area.
This is disgraceful and another clear example of why the Vodafone takeover of three should have been blocked.
Consumers have gone from being offered uncapped 5G broadband that offered on average *at least* 150Mb speeds for £12 a month to a *capped* “up to 150Mbps” service for nearly double to cost.
It’s ridiculous less competition means higher prices not susprised we will be paying £48 for unlimited sim cannot see three MvNo offering unlimited data in the future less than £25 cheapest going is id mobile £15 no speed cap no prices increases
Very dependent on where you are and the time of day.
I wouldn’t want it in central London I have seen <10Mbs on 5G too often.
Worked okayish when waiting for my fibre to be installed.
It was a relief to be on a fibre though when it arrived.
Sounds interesting – do customers get a public IP, or is this functionally identical to using a SIM only subscription?
Three 5G has been a godsend in house in a rural town (where Three had lit up 5G NSA), and he only alternative was openreach FTTC at 40mbs, which openreach managed to accidentally cut off in the street cabinet while fiddling around to get a neighbour on FTTC digital voice, and NOW could not manage to get turned back on quickly (out of contract anyway, so goodbye!)
Three cheaply and quickly sorted the problem out; although the Three supplied router (second gen ZTE) needs a reboot every few weeks as it jams up (my samknows whitebox pings out multiple times per day testing the line)
It will be intellectually interesting to see if Voda 5G would work in the same location–Voda/O2 mast in town has less coverage, so maybe the router would also pick up the signal from the Three/EE mast or struggle with the Voda mast.
Interesting tip on using ID mobile in a 5G router (as long as the cap was fairly generous for work from home days.
This is expensive. When you can go with talkmobile which is owned by Vodafone for £16 for unlimited (via uswitch) at the fastest speeds you can get, it’s just a rip off. Oh, plus it’s 30 days minimum.
150Mb is 4G speed, I have an old tp-link router that tests reliably at 140Mb
Tp-link 5G router is testing around 400Mb
Tested with Lebara and id mobile (use it for barn / garage CCTV)
With Hutchinson selling up the intentions of Vodafone are now clear, roll out Vodafone “equivalents” of Three services and plans that cost significantly more and offer less. Then close down the three brand, leaving only the poorer expensive option for customers to migrate to as their contracts expire.
It’s quite clever as it spreads out the consumer anger, people aren’t switched all in one go and the cheaper options still technically exist when they launch their more expensive packages, minimising press scrutiny and the likelihood of damaging “Vodafone doubles prices for three customers” headlines, despite that being exactly what they are doing.
I bought a refurbished unlocked 5G EE router from Amazon and stuck an ID Mobile Unlimited sim (£15 a month) in it and am getting between 400-800Mbps.
@ACdeag Yes, it’s great right now, but the new Vodafone broadband plans clearly indicate the direction Vodafone intent to take things once the CMA conditions on their purchase of Three expire in 18 months time.
iD Mobile can only offer a £15 unlimited SIM because they’re still within the terms of an MVNO contract signed with Three before a Vodafone took over. Those deals will all come up for renewal in the next couple of years and sadly I expect we’ll see cheap mobile data disappear from the UK market.
Good luck if you buy this and think it’ll work off a 3 mast. The MOCN especially in my area is very temperamental. Have to switch off my VF phone completely and then it’ll connect to the 3 mast for just a matter of minutes before defaulting back to a weak 4G again (where the 3 mast is closer). Maybe the SIM inside the router will be prioritized but I doubt it. There may well be some logic as to the usage dependencies of the MOCN but in my opinion it doesn’t very well / not consistent.