Broadband is simply the connection that brings the internet into your home. Everything else, the brand names, the speeds, the technology labels and the contract terms, sits on top of that one idea. This guide explains what each part actually means, in plain English, so you can work out what you have now and what would be worth moving to.
What broadband actually is
Broadband is an always on connection to the internet. There is nothing to dial and nothing to connect each time you want to use it. It arrives at your property over a cable or, in some cases, over the mobile network, and your router then shares it with your devices.
It is worth separating two things that get used interchangeably. Broadband is the connection into the building. Wifi is the wireless technology that carries it around the house once it has arrived. When people say their broadband is slow, the culprit is very often the wifi instead. Our guide to the difference between broadband and wifi covers how to tell which one is at fault.
How speed is measured
Broadband speed is measured in megabits per second, usually written Mb or Mbps. The higher the number, the more data can move at once.
One point causes more confusion than any other: megabits are not megabytes. There are eight bits in a byte, so a 100 Mb connection downloads at a maximum of around 12.5 MB per second. If a download seems to be running at roughly an eighth of the speed you expected, this is why, and nothing is wrong.
Download and upload are different numbers
Download speed governs everything coming towards you: streaming, browsing, downloading files. Upload speed governs everything going out: video calls, sending large files, cloud backups, and the return traffic in online gaming.
Most connections give you far more download than upload, because that reflects how households use the internet. Providers advertise the download figure, so the upload one is easy to overlook. If you work from home it is arguably the more important of the two, and our guide to broadband upload speeds explains what to look for.
What "average speed" means in an advert
UK providers must advertise an average speed rather than a best case one. That average is the speed available to at least half of their customers at peak time, which Ofcom defines as between 8pm and 10pm. It is a far more honest figure than the "up to" speeds used years ago, but it is still an average across many homes, not a promise about yours.
The number that applies to you is the personalised estimate your provider gives you before you sign, along with a guaranteed minimum. That minimum is the figure you can hold them to if the connection underperforms.
The main types of broadband
Almost every UK package is one of the following. Which ones you can get depends entirely on your address.
ADSL
The oldest of the technologies still in service, ADSL runs entirely over the copper telephone line. Speeds are modest, typically in the region of 10 Mb, and they fall the further you are from the telephone exchange. It is now being retired and is worth moving away from if anything else is available.
Part fibre, also called fibre to the cabinet
Sold as "fibre" or "superfast", this runs fibre optic cable to the green street cabinet and then copper for the final stretch to your house. Speeds are usually somewhere between 30 Mb and 70 Mb.
The copper section is the weak link. The further your house sits from that cabinet, the more speed you lose, which is why two neighbours on the same package can get noticeably different results. Despite the name, this is not a full fibre connection.
Full fibre, also called fibre to the premises
Here the fibre runs the whole way to your building, with no copper involved. Speeds commonly start around 100 Mb and run to 1000 Mb or beyond, and because there is no copper the distance to the exchange stops mattering. Upload speeds are much better too, sometimes matching the download speed entirely.
Full fibre now reaches the large majority of UK homes and is the connection worth having wherever it is available. Our guide to how fibre optic broadband works explains the technology, and you can compare full fibre deals directly.
Cable
Virgin Media runs its own network using coaxial cable for the last stretch rather than copper phone line or fibre. Download speeds compete with full fibre, but upload speeds are typically much lower. Our guide to the difference between cable and fibre covers this in more detail.
Mobile and 5G home broadband
Instead of a fixed line, a router connects to the mobile network. It needs no engineer visit and can be set up the day it arrives, which makes it useful for rented homes, short stays and addresses where the fixed line options are poor. Speeds depend on how far you are from the mast and how busy the network is, so it is less consistent than a fixed connection.
Networks and providers are not the same thing
This is the part that confuses most people, and understanding it makes the market far easier to read.
Most UK providers do not own the cables reaching your house. Openreach owns the largest network, and BT, Sky, TalkTalk, EE, Plusnet, Vodafone and many others all sell services over it. That is why so many different brands offer suspiciously similar speeds: they are selling access to the same physical line.
Two exceptions matter. Virgin Media owns its own cable network. And a growing number of smaller companies, often called altnets, have built their own full fibre networks in particular towns and cities. Where one of these has reached your street, it often offers the fastest and cheapest option available, so it is worth checking who serves your address rather than assuming the familiar names are the only choice. You can browse every provider we cover or check what is available where you live.
The jargon you will meet
- Mb or Mbps: megabits per second, the unit of speed.
- FTTC: fibre to the cabinet, meaning part fibre.
- FTTP: fibre to the premises, meaning full fibre.
- ONT: the small box fitted inside your home on a full fibre connection, where the fibre terminates.
- Latency or ping: the delay before data starts moving, measured in milliseconds. It matters more than raw speed for online gaming and video calls.
- Contention: how many properties share capacity on the same local network. High contention is why speeds drop in the evening.
- Traffic management: a provider prioritising some kinds of traffic over others at busy times. They have to tell you their policy before you sign.
- USO: the universal service obligation, Ofcom's guarantee that every UK home can request a connection of at least 10 Mb download and 1 Mb upload.
What a broadband deal actually costs
The headline monthly price is rarely the whole figure. Before you commit, check for a setup or activation fee, whether the price shown is a discounted rate that ends partway through the term, and what the price becomes when the contract finishes.
Also check the annual increase. Since January 2025 providers have had to state any mid-contract rise in pounds and pence before you sign, rather than tying it to inflation, which makes deals far easier to compare honestly. Our guide to mid-contract price rises explains how these work and when you can leave without a penalty.
The most expensive mistake is doing nothing. Out of contract prices are typically much higher than anything offered to a new customer, so a contract that quietly rolls on costs real money. Our guide to saving money on your broadband covers what to do at the end of a term.
The old phone network is being switched off
The traditional analogue telephone network is being retired, currently scheduled for the end of January 2027. Home phone services are moving to run over your broadband connection instead, which is usually a matter of plugging the handset into the router rather than the wall socket.
If you have a landline, your provider should contact you about the change. It is worth being aware of if you rely on a home phone, or on anything else that uses the phone line such as a personal alarm or an older alarm system.
Working out what you need
Start with how many people use the connection at once and what they do with it. A single person browsing and streaming needs very little. A household with several people working from home, gaming and watching in 4K at the same time needs considerably more. Our guide to what broadband speed you really need puts figures against each case, and finding the right broadband deal walks through the other decisions such as contract length and whether to add TV.
If you already have broadband, run a speed test before changing anything. Knowing what you currently get, and whether it matches what you pay for, tells you whether you need a faster package or simply need to fix something at home.
When you are ready, compare broadband deals for your address, or use the savings checker to see how your current bill compares with what is available now.