Fixed Broadband Growth Slows as Global Subscribers Top 1.13bn

New research from Point Topic has found that world fixed broadband subscribers grew by just 1.25% (13.9 million) in Q1 2020 to total 1.13 billion, but the main impact from COVID-19 won’t be understood until Q2 and Q3. Meanwhile almost every connection technology saw growth, except copper (ADSL etc.) lines that fell -10.3% year-on-year.

In the past China has tended to generate a big chunk of subscriber growth in the broadband market, but despite this they spent a big part of the first quarter in an extremely strict lockdown due to the Coronavirus. As a result of that it’s not surprising to see their Q1 growth slump to 1.45% (it’s usually 3-5%) and we suspect other countries will follow in future updates.

Meanwhile the United Kingdom continues to be the 8th largest country for subscribers with a total of around 27 million and happily we’re one of several countries with quarterly “full fibre” (FTTP) broadband growth rates in double figures – including Belgium (23.4%), Colombia (16.5%), Thailand (14.2%), Pakistan (13.9%), the UK (12.6%) and Brazil (12.2%).

In terms of annual changes, between Q1 2019 and Q1 2020 the number of copper broadband lines globally fell by 10.3%, while FTTP connections increased by 12.1% and hybrid fibre (FTTx / FTTC) by 5%. In fact every connection type saw growth, except slow old copper.