Altnet Broadband ISP Grain Expands UK Full Fibre Network in Grimsby
Carlisle-based alternative broadband operator Grain, which in July 2025 secured a major £225m funding boost (here), has announced that they’re expanding the coverage of their gigabit-capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) network deeper into one of their original deployment towns – Grimsby in Lincolnshire.
The operator’s broadband network, which is home to over 43,000 customers and covers 270,000 UK premises (aiming to reach 600,000 in the future), first began deploying across Grimsby a few years back and ended up covering around 15-20% of local premises before stopping. But Grain is now in the process of expanding upon this, primarily by moving westward from the town centre (e.g. the streets around Haven Avenue and Vera Terrace).
The official announcement doesn’t say much more than to confirm that “even more homes in town can now get connected,” although it’s an unusual move given the presence of so many rivals. The town is already well covered by FTTP from Openreach, Virgin Media and MS3. Not to mention some more limited network builds, such as from KCOM.
Advertisement
So far as we can tell, Grain’s expansion area is largely already being covered by three of their rivals, which makes it difficult to understand their rationale. Sadly, the announcement doesn’t mention how many premises they’re aiming to cover.
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.
« CWP Develops Own Broadband Switching Solution for UK Business ISPs
Advertisement
Leave a Reply
Privacy Notice: Please note that news comments are anonymous, which means that we do NOT require you to enter any real personal details to post a message and display names can be almost anything you like (provided they do not contain offensive language or impersonate a real persons legal name). By clicking to submit a post you agree to storing your entries for comment content, display name, IP and email in our database, for as long as the post remains live.
Only the submitted name and comment will be displayed in public, while the rest will be kept private (we will never share this outside of ISPreview, regardless of whether the data is real or fake). This comment system uses submitted IP, email and website address data to spot abuse and spammers. All data is transferred via an encrypted (https secure) session.
Be better doing Waltham on the outskirts of Grimsby. Openreach have not deployed much there yet and they would only have VMO2 HFC to compete against.
No I can see Quickline easily beating them to covering all the surrounding villages. Grain have a track record of questionable rollouts and, given they use cgnat along with locking down routers preventing even WiFi password changes (unless they’ve changed their ways) I wouldn’t want them.
Grain been very disappointing for me. Just bought a property (new build) on a Grain street. Very responsive email support but they clearly don’t want me as a customer. Just said there’s no room in the ducts to connect me. Even stated I was looking for the top package and to be a loyal customer. No can do, but get to see Grain vans taunting me driving down the street.
Haven’t had much luck with OpenReach ISPs and trying to get a connection that way either, best BT could offer was 20 meg ADSL.
Funnily enough Virgin, who I’m more than accustomed to, got in touch pretty quickly with a local chap who added my address to their system. Signed up with them, £125 cashback on Topcashback and they’re installing next week. The whole signup process really fluid and smooth. Looks like Virgin have finally gotten the kick up the backside they’ve been deserved for so long! Good old capitalism.