Hyperoptic to Extend UK FTTP Broadband Coverage via Openreach
In a significant strategic development. City-focused UK ISP Hyperoptic, which has spent the past few years deploying their own alternative full fibre (FTTP/B) gigabit broadband network to cover 1.9 million premises (up from 1.73m in July 2024), has confirmed to ISPreview that they plan to extend this to “at least” another 1 million premises – albeit using Openreach’s FTTP products.
The operator, which at the start of this year suffered another round of redundancies and is currently present across parts of 64 UK locations (towns and cities), is understood to have informed their staff of the latest development this afternoon. In addition, Hyperoptic has also shared that this month it passed 400,000 active subscribers (up from 340,000 in July 2024), and covered “over” 1.9 million homes (just below their 2m target).
Adopting Openreach’s national network for their expansion marks a radical shift for a provider that has long prided itself on building their own independent network. But they certainly wouldn’t be the first alternative network operator to find some merit in extending their reach by harnessing a rival operator’s platform (e.g. toob did the same via CityFibre).
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Some readers will no doubt wonder why Hyperoptic will only be launching this new partnership with an additional 1 million homes via Openreach’s network, which is a small fraction of the nearly 19 million premises covered by the incumbents new Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network (not to mention their aim of covering “up to” 30m by 2030). But the answer may come in their use of “at least“, with this perhaps being more of an initial phase.
Dana Tobak CBE, Hyperoptic’s CEO and co-founder, said:
“We have built a solid reputation of delivering best-in-class customer experience to our current footprint of 64 towns and cities, placing us in a unique position within the market. To support our growth ambition, and to bring the Hyperoptic experience to more consumers, we have taken a strategic decision to make our services available via the Openreach platform from next year.
This expansion is good news for both existing consumers and new customers looking to improve their service. Our research highlights that most customers who leave us do so because they’re moving home. We understand home movers would prefer to take their Hyperoptic service with them, so today’s announcement will make that possible, and our customers can continue to enjoy Hyperoptic for many years.”
Hyperoptic said that its preparations for launching this are already underway and the first c.1 million homes should start to become accessible “during early 2026” (Q1). The ISP declined to provide any details on their related packages and prices, although we suspect that these will end up differing a bit from Hyperoptic’s own products.
The gradual move to integrate Openreach’s platform into their own suggests that they’ll probably be looking to deliver a deeper integration. But it may also reflect the time it takes to develop the new systems for handling a second network (can be quite a complex task if you do it all in-house).
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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good to see further recognition of Openreach’s status as the national champion. With symmetric and multi gig apparently on the way, what’s not to like about it.
Lack of 50G-PON usage.
The price, I can get the same speed symmetrical via CityFibre for literally half the price as Openreach.
Oh good grief.
Love, the 50GPON guy.
Lack of symmetrical speeds that’s at affordable price that’s main issue and there 1gig symmetrical service costing £100 a month at this very moment that’s the only thing I dislike about openreach/BT if that changed in the future then maybe I’d agree with you
The champion that is only doing a rollout because they had to for survival after others dragged the industry forward and that also have no FTTP service where I lvie whilst CityFibre deployed here.
The coverage lol
Like to place an order but nothing in our area, but exactly remote
One day perhaps, we must be part of someone’s rollout 😉
as regards price – Openreach are a sustainable, profitable business. CityFibre’s debt problems are well known, but today’s Torygraph seems to be suggesting that a sale or at least partial injection of capital is on the cards. How long will those low, low prices last?
No one outside of Openreach (and perhaps certain employees of its customers who are under NDA) know what they intend to charge for the mass market symmetric and multi gig services.
You are so funny.
@Ivor: Openreach is heavily regulated by OFCOM and must be transparent about its pricing. Everyone will know about the prices and also Openreach is forbidden to offer better terms or prices to BT’s retail divisions than it offers to other ISPs.
Great work all round!
Not really news, they have been doing this for some time.
They’ve been using Openreach’s PIA product to run their own fibre via existing ducts/poles, but that’s not at all the same thing as taking Openreach’s own FTTP products. We’ve not heard about this happening before, but please feel free to share where you spotted it?
Mark , they use Openreach EAD to provide connectivity at a lot of MDU and new sites .
Yes, but like PIA, still not the same thing as offering Openreach FTTP products.
So Hyperoptic are going to be an ISP via Openreach s network on FTTP? It’s been a long day and my brain has faded!
Seems a bit strange, but I suppose it is a way for them to reach customers their network don’t. Virgin did it for a while.
Does this not feel a bit like a company needing to add some growth without heavy capital investment? They’ve got a GPON network that they’re happy to max out at 1Gbps, and they exist in a footprint that also has Community Fibre available who will sell you a 5Gbps connection, who also seemingly dictate the pricing of Hyperoptic services as they’re identical for 1Gbps.
I want to like Hyperoptic but they don’t seem to have a clear path out of this 1Gbps limit they’ve forced on themselves with the early fibre-to-the-building approach, and the knowledgable people in the networks team (or at least the way to get to them) have long gone. They’ve gone from a trailblazer to a bit of an also-ran in the last few years, which is unfortunate.
Not related to this article I know but I spotted this in the Telegraph. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/06/09/cityfibre-owners-court-virgin-media-o2-cash-crunch/
Will a new provider classification be required? Perhaps: NOTAltNet?
Hyperoptic dont have their own physical ‘network’. Apart from a few ‘hyper zones’
They have built FTTB (fibre to the building) where in each case they take a connection from Openreach or colt or whoever to connect that building. In most of this cases they are the only fibre option to the residents of these buildings.
They are now going to stop doing that and just resell on Openreach wholesale network.
It doesn’t say they’re stopping that in the article though, has that been confirmed elsewhere?
I work at hyperoptic and this isn’t stopping at all, we will continue to build our own network where it suits and use openreach where the interest is.
Presume using Openreach where you already have the equipment and backhaul at the exchange. Fairly cheap, simple way of increasing the accessible market.
Bit of feedback. Even on FTTP installing cabinets, selling symmetrical gigabit seem to be backhauling it with a single gigabit, much as you have with buildings since 2011. Stop doing this. It’s really obvious when people see heavy slowdown at peak times that impacts downstream way more than upstream.
Talking of 2011 you’ve been selling gigabit as top tier for 14 years. Doesn’t seem to be much of a plan to increase this given you’re installing GPON. Also unless you’re using combo optics and cards from the start that’s more cost later on.
Gone from market leader to behind the curve given all the XGSPON multigig services. Both five and eight gig are available to larger footprints than yours. Any chance of a reboot and a push to 2.5 perhaps?
Appreciate it means you can’t backhaul switches and OLTs with gigabit anymore but the copper should be okay and I assume the OLTs are field upgradable as installing anything that isn’t in 2025 is insane.
Thanks.
The reason why Openreach symmetric is £100+ per month expensive is probably the same reason why fibre-on-demand is so expensive. There will hopefully soon be a time when it launches for the mass market at a sensible price.
Maybe Openreach could acquire the Hyperoptic fibre in buildings? Also Openreach would benefit from the Hyperoptic model of securing wayleaves. There would be a good fit between the companies.
At last, you can get an ISP on Openreach which offers the full CGNAT experience.
It’s ironic that Virgin have recently published in their partner connect 2025 awards ‘Altnet of the year : Hyperoptic’ as one of the key infrastructure partners.
I’d be interested to know if they have been utilising Virgin Media Business leased lines for Backhaul into the FTTP cabinets as the only information I have seen online refers to Openreach EAD.