UK Struggles in Ranking of World’s Fastest Cities for Broadband

Advertisement

1. Anuraj says:

   October 18, 2022 at 9:27 am

   Fixed Broadband:-

   Slow rollout. Openreach expect to complete fiber rollout by 2025.
   Rubbish. Maybe 2030

   Mobile Broadband band: –

   Not enough spectrum and people don’t want mobile mast in their town/village.

   Three UK applied to built 5g mast and refused by local council because of complaints received by local residents.

   Like some countries 3 operators enough instead 4. Each operators can get equal shares of spectrum like Switzerland.

   1. Mark Jackson says:

      October 18, 2022 at 9:58 am

      Openreach expect to complete their FTTP rollout to 25 million premises by December 2026, not “by 2025”, and they look reasonably likely to achieve that.

   2. Sonic says:

      October 18, 2022 at 1:01 pm

      Except for the towns and cities that will never get it. Not by 2026, not ever.

      And don’t even get me started on the state of mobile in the UK. Going abroad is an eye-opening experience in how good mobile data can actually be, if done properly. Was in Zurich recently and got scary fast 5G nearly everywhere.

   3. Winston Smith says:

      October 19, 2022 at 9:32 am

      Which UK cities will never get FTTP?

   4. Sonic says:

      October 19, 2022 at 10:06 am

      Not “never”, but at least not in the next 4-6 years at least. Winchester, Hampshire is a good candidate for that list. All my research suggests no rollout plans by anyone in the near/distant future. All of the usual suspects claim it is “commercially unviable”.

      Ditto for 5G (or even half-decent 4G coverage here).

   5. Winston Smith says:

      October 19, 2022 at 11:03 am

      There are many urban areas that don’t yet feature in current Openreach plans that they will have to include to reach their 25 million by emd of 2026 target.

2. XGS Is On says:

   October 18, 2022 at 10:03 am

   These numbers shouldn’t be a huge surprise. Until relatively recently the incumbent in the UK had built more full fibre in rural areas than major urban centres.

   The way broadband in the UK is regulated is also actively hostile to good performance in these charts. Can’t sell a faster ‘up to’ service that may slow unnoticeably unless you’re addicted to speed testing at peak but run full speed 90% of the time, have to go lower.

   UK consumers have been tought by Ofcom and the ASA that the top line speed is what they are paying for and not a kilobit less.

3. sebbb says:

   October 18, 2022 at 10:53 am

   I would also add that in most of the first countries there’s no thing such as the shameful 80/20 profile on FTTP, so if customers have a higher baseline speed the average and median are of course higher. Not to mention that in places like Italy (one of the countries I know the most as I am italian, but also other EU countries are similar like Spain with its minimum 300/300Mb) there’s nothing below 1G/300M and things like “wayleave agreements” are no issue, because law was made that puts FTTP above the landlord rights, ISPs can simply get in and build as long as there is no damage to the property and any digging/underground works are restored in the original condition.

   1. Sonic says:

      October 19, 2022 at 10:10 am

      I was in Florence a few years ago and even at height of the tourist season, I was getting ~100 Mbps speeds on 4G (I was running a speed test while stood in the middle of a sea of people). Even half-way up Tuscan mountains the mobile coverage was excellent and our remote holiday home had FTTP.

   2. sebbb says:

      October 19, 2022 at 3:36 pm

      @Sonic oh yeah well, regarding mobile coverage there’s a very particular situation: italian law says electric fields around mobile masts in urban areas must not exceed 6V/m for majority of the day. That means carriers must build a higher number of them with lower power, thus loading the sites with less customers than other countries on average (I believe UK has a limit of 60V/m).

4. BT engineer retired says:

   October 18, 2022 at 1:12 pm

   No surprise here. When I analysed OR fibre rollout plan in April 22 London was at the bottom. Remember being on the OR plan does not mean that you will get fibre until Dec 26. Also OR work by exchange areas and hence my list is the number of exchange areas on the rollout plan. These are my figures for some of the UK city’s
   London 38%
   Belfast 100%
   Glasgow 92%
   Leeds 82%
   Coventry 76%
   Manchester 86%
   Birmingham 68%
   Bristol 71%
   Sheffield 75%
   Cardiff 100%
   London with 38% is way behind any of the other UK cities and is on par with Chon in Buri Thailand.
   Moreover VM mostly have a presence in OR fibre Area’s. In London there are some large areas that do not figure on any rollout plans. Although Community Fibre seem to be filling some of these gaps. All the fibre rollout focus is on rural areas and it looks like London will be one of the last places to be fully FTTP.

   1. sebbb says:

      October 18, 2022 at 7:49 pm

      > In London there are some large areas that do not figure on any rollout plans. Although Community Fibre seem to be filling some of these gaps

      yup, as here: south Catford, no VM, no OR FTTP (they left out only my street in the whole neighbourhood lol) – happy CF customer since march.

5. Karen C says:

   October 19, 2022 at 2:46 pm

   Not surprised by the table really. The UK is a joke for broadband and mobile signal.
   I live in the South West and my mobile phone signal is non-existent. Broadband is good. I have FTTP.
   My brother on the other hand lives in a London borough. He can’t get FTTP with BT. They only provide 3-7 Mbps download. Yes you read that right 3-7 Mbps. However his mobile phone signal is excellent.

6. Dave G says:

   October 21, 2022 at 11:26 am

   Can anyone explain why Hull is not on that list given that KCOM have rolled out FTTH as standard for the best part of 10 years and roughly 98% of the city can get FTTH.