The Average Cost Per Megabit by Broadband Tech and Country for Q3 2013

The latest Q3-2013 analysis of global broadband tariffs has found that the cost of slower copper based (ADSL) broadband ISP services has increased in Western Europe. Meanwhile the Megabit price of superfast fibre optic and cable (FTTH, FTTC, DOCSIS3 etc.) based technologies has become even cheaper.

Globally the average monthly charge for residential broadband services is now $75.87 (£47.21), which is up slightly from the $72.52 recorded at the end of 2012. Crucially though the average bandwidth provided by residential services has jumped to 46.7Mbps (Megabits per second) in Q3-2013 from 36Mbps in 2012.

The faster speeds therefore make it unsurprising to find that the average global cost per megabit (Mb) was $1.63 (£1) at the end of Q3-2013, which is sharply less than the $2 recorded for 2012. The decline is being driven by the ever faster connection speeds that fibre and cable based connections are pumping out.

Meanwhile the price of slower ADSL (copper) lines in Western Europe has risen from $2.01 per Megabit in 2012 to $2.87 now. By comparison cable stands at $0.70 (down from $0.86 in 2012) and fibre services dropped to $0.60 (down from $0.68); see the full 2012 results here. However it’s worth remembering that Fibre broadband residential services were “typically more expensive” due to an average global monthly charge of $82 (i.e. you pay a lot but you get more Megabits back than with copper).

It’s worth pointing out that the average monthly charge for residential broadband services in the United Kingdom is well below the average on $48 (the same as France), which makes us the 23rd cheapest country; Romania was the cheapest overall and charge just $22. But as ever it’s very difficult to compare different packages and the speeds are not based on real-world performance (i.e. they’re headline / advertised rates).