More BT broadband customers get faster download speeds, but Virgin Media still miles ahead

BT has connected thousands more of its customers to faster full-fibre broadband. In its latest progress report, BT-owned Openreach confirmed that it has connected an additional 620,000 customers to next-generation broadband in the last three months. That brings the total to 5.78 million premises nationwide, compared to 5.16 million during the previous financial quarter.

Full-fibre broadband is a huge step-up from older copper technology as it’s capable of beaming data at faster speeds (up to 1Gbps) and boosting upload speeds – essential for smooth video calls and backing up data to the cloud. Not only that, but fibre-optic cables are more durable and aren’t impacted by bad weather, unlike copper cables. The 1,000Mbps download speeds available with full-fibre connections are over 14x faster than the average broadband speed in the UK, which was recorded at 70Mbps earlier this year.

In reality, those ludicrous speeds are more likely to come in handy in busy households. If you have multiple people at home streaming boxsets from Netflix in Ultra HD 4K quality, making video calls, streaming music, backing up their photos or downloading operating system updates to their laptops, smartphones and more …that’s when you’ll really notice the difference. After all, Netflix only suggests 25Mbps to stream in 4K… but that soon adds up when you have multiple people trying to watch at the same time in different rooms, while others are making calls, software updates are happening in the background, others are playing online multiplayer games, and you still want Alexa to respond immediately on your Echo.

While Virgin Media looks likely to reach its goal of bringing a gigabit-capable connection to 14.3 million homes by the end of the year, the company is pushing ahead with plans to bring full-fibre connections – capable of even faster speeds – to those same premises by 2028.