
Telecommunication in Jamaica
Compared to the United States, Jamaica is massively lagging behind in the development of telecommunications. Under the country code +1876, there were a total of 3.38 million connections in 2021. Among them were 2.91 million mobile phones, which corresponds to an average of 1.0 per person. In the US, this figure is 1.1 mobile phones per person.With about 3,906 webhosts, Jamaica is below the world's average by population. At the end of 2020, 475 of these, or about 12 percent, were secured with SSL or comparable encryption.
Back to overview: Jamaica
Development of telephone and internet connections
With an average download speed of 49.97 Mbit/second for fixed-network broadband internet, Jamaica ranks 79th in an international comparison. The upload rate was only 32.10 Mbit/second (58th place).In mobile internet, i.e., on tablets and smartphones, Jamaica comes 65th with a download speed of 32.76 Mbit/second. The upload speed of around 9 Mbit was only enough for 104th place.
The Speedtest Global Index published regularly by Ookla is based on several million individual measurements in December 2022 from 178 countries.
The following diagrams show the development of the various telephone and internet connections as a percentage of the country's population. Values above 100 percent mean that, on average, every inhabitant has more than one connection.
Access to the internet in Jamaica from 1990 - 2019
Broadband internet in Jamaica 2001 - 2021

Landlines 1990 - 2021
Mobile phones 1990 - 2021
Distribution in 2021 | Jamaica Total | Jamaica percent | USA Total | USA percent |
---|---|---|---|---|
Broadband users | 413,500.00 | 14.62 % | 127.03 m | 38.27 % |
Landlines | 473,617.00 | 16.75 % | 97.11 m | 29.26 % |
Mobile cellulars | 2.91 m | 102.75 % | 361.62 m | 108.96 % |