How does UK broadband compare to the rest of the world in 2024?

Although it’s human nature to complain about unsatisfactory service, few of us have genuine grounds for complaint about our home broadband speeds.

With the majority of UK homes now served by at least one full fibre broadband network, and frustrating concepts like Midband banished to the history books, internet speeds are generally satisfactory.

Nowadays, we’re more likely to encounter problems trying to connect to a 4G network in a football ground or maintain streaming-friendly connection speeds in a hotel.

Where domestic broadband connectivity issues do arise, they’re often to do with inadequate router range, or heavy demand (such as several people trying to stream content at once).

Line speed seems to become less of a problem with every passing year, especially as the rollout of full fibre broadband continues apace.

However, it’s still instructive to consider how domestic connectivity compares to global broadband speeds.

The recent release of an annual ISP speed report across 229 countries and territories sheds a fascinating light on the UK’s global performance…

Speed and power

One reason why fewer people complain about sluggish internet access nowadays is that connection speeds are increasing while our demand has broadly plateaued.

Compared to 2023’s average figure of 93.62Mbps, in 2024, the UK recorded an average (mean) download speed of 110.99Mbps – an 18 per cent rise over a twelve-month period.

Even in households needing connections faster than 93Mbps, an extra 16Mbps of speed may be enough to negate buffering, delays or latency.

Analyst firm M-Lab compiled its figures from 1.5 billion global speed tests conducted over a twelve-month period to the end of June this year.

Its findings also correlate with other surveys suggesting superfast broadband (30Mbps or more) is available in 98 per cent of UK homes, with full fibre available in two thirds of dwellings.

Comparing the UK with global broadband speeds

The UK’s average speed of 110.99Mbps is double the average global broadband download speed reported in the M-Lab survey.

Yet remarkably, it’s only enough to place us 35th in the 229-nation/territory rankings.

The UK actually performed worse than in last year’s survey, where we finished 34th overall.

Our average connection speeds remain underwhelming compared with Iceland (279.55Mbps) and Denmark (210.51Mbps), who finished first and fifth respectively.

Jersey also outperformed us, with an average speed of 273.51Mbps, though the island’s small footprint and concentrated population make full fibre cabling easier to roll out nationally.

Then again, similar characteristics weren’t enough to save the British Indian Ocean Territory from recording the lowest overall score in the survey – just 2.38Mbps.

The UK finished below the likes of New Zealand, Israel and Hungary in the final league table, though we did outperform Ireland, Germany and Australia.

In total, 35 nations failed to achieve average download speeds of 10Mbps or more – the threshold Ofcom has set as a minimum requirement for a family or small business in the UK.

Consumers reading this article on an asymmetrical 11Mbps ADSL connection won’t be best pleased by that statement, especially if they regularly send large emails or want to watch 4K content.

However, some households choose to maintain a slower connection rather than subscribing to a full fibre service they might regard as expensive, superfluous or potentially troublesome.

While UK connectivity could clearly be improved upon, rising connection speeds aren’t being mirrored by significantly higher levels of data consumption.

Perhaps those longstanding grumbles about internet connection speeds really are becoming a relic of a bygone (internet) age…