Fibre broadband - what's stopping you from upgrading?

When we surveyed nearly 4,000 broadband customers, a fifth told us they still had standard (also known as ADSL) broadband, and that's despite fibre broadband being available in 98% of premises, according to Ofcom.

So what's stopping us from upgrading? It often comes down to misconceptions about the availability of faster services, the potential costs and benefits. We surveyed more than 2,000 people who had upgraded to a fibre connection having previously had standard broadband - find out what improvements they noticed.

Is fibre broadband noticeably faster?

It’s natural to expect fibre to be faster than a standard broadband connection, but you might have wondered whether you need this extra speed, or even whether you’d notice it. When we asked people who are still using standard broadband why they hadn't upgraded, some 41% said they were happy with the speed they were getting.

Speed is certainly one advantage of fibre connections – nearly two thirds said they noticed faster speeds since upgrading to a fibre broadband package, plus nearly half said that downloads were faster and a third said that using streaming services for music, film and television had become smoother. 

Is fibre broadband more reliable?

Speed isn't the only important thing to consider when it comes to your connection – a large proportion of customers find fibre more reliable, too. This comes down to the cables that are used to make up the network. 

Standard broadband uses the copper phone network which is less reliable thanks to age and can be affected by extreme weather. Fibre broadband relies on light signals that are resilient over long distances. 

Full fibre connections are the gold standard here - they rely entirely on fibre optic wiring and can offer the fastest speeds. Unsurprisingly, customers who had chosen a full fibre connection were the most likely to tell us they'd noticed an improvement to their service since upgrading. Full fibre users were also less likely to have experienced issues like very slow speeds, frequent connection drop outs, difficulties downloading files or problems with video calling.

What's faster than superfast broadband?

While the vast majority of premises in the UK can access superfast speeds, even higher speeds are becoming more common too. 

‘Ultrafast’ connections with speeds of at least 100Mbps (Megabits per second) are now available to 77% of UK homes. Some 76% of UK households can access the fastest type of connection – ‘gigabit-capable’ broadband with speeds of 1,000Mbps (also known as 1Gbps) or more. Gigabit-capable broadband is often delivered using full fibre networks (where all of the cables used are fibre optic ones).

Eventually all of the UK's broadband connections will be delivered using full fibre networks and the copper phone network will be retired, though that's still a few years off - the UK government's aim is for at least 85% of the UK to have access to gigabit-capable broadband by 2025. But if you have a superfast fibre connection (average speeds between 30Mbps and 99Mbps) and live in a large household (or enjoy gaming), you could benefit from an upgrade to a faster connection sooner.

Does fibre broadband cost more? 

While you might expect fibre to be more expensive than standard broadband, that’s not always the case. If you’ve been with the same provider for some time, there’s a strong risk you’re paying over the odds for a standard broadband deal. 

Customers typically move from a cheaper introductory deal on to a pricier standard tariff once their minimum contract period ends. If you’ve been with your provider for more than 12 months, there’s a chance you’re paying this higher price – and could therefore stand to improve your connection and save money if you switch. The fact that many providers now put prices up every year compounds that risk even further.

Even customers signing up to a new broadband deal will find fibre broadband prices competitive – it usually only costs a couple of pounds more each month, but in many cases is the same price as a standard broadband package – or cheaper.



source https://www.which.co.uk/news/article/fibre-broadband-whats-stopping-you-from-upgrading-aJgzQ5U1upsB
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