Mobile communications and Internet in South Korea

Internet speed for cell phones and fixed network

With an average download speed of 114.69 Mbit/second for fixed-network broadband internet, South Korea ranks 27th in an international comparison. The upload rate was only 93.85 Mbit/second (18th place).
In mobile internet, i.e., on tablets and smartphones, South Korea comes 8th with a download speed of 110.59 Mbit/second. The upload speed of around 14 Mbit was only enough for 30th place.

The Speedtest Global Index published regularly by Ookla is based on several million individual measurements in April 2023 from 180 countries.

Mobile phone rates in South Korea

Every year, the International Telecommunication Union calculates for many countries what a mobile phone contract costs to use. A monthly budget averaging US$ 23.50 was calculated South Korea in 2021. This is about the same value as in the previous year.

The ITU refers to the costs for monthly use and includes 140 telephony minutes, 70 text messages and a data transfer of 2 GBytes. The transfer speed should be the minimum of a 3G connection, i.e. at least UMTS, which is already outdated in many parts of the world. 2 GBytes do not sound much. However, this is already quite a high consumption in a worldwide comparison. If one does not take a fixed amount in US dollars, but converts it to the economic output per inhabitant, a user in South Korea spends 0.85% of his gross national income on mobile telephony. Worldwide, this rate is around 6.6 percent.

In the USA, the monthly cost was around $38.10.

Network coverage with 5G

In 2021, network coverage with the 5G standard was already 98 percent of all inhabitants. The proportion of the population with at least 4G mobile Internet access was 99.9 percent. The 4G network standard includes both LTE and WiMAX.

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 South Korea from 1990 - 2021

Broadband internet in South Korea 1998 - 2021

South Korea is doing very well in the expansion of broadband internet connections. Around 98 percent of all residents have access to the internet. Around 44 percent have their own fast internet connection, which is at least faster than the former ISDN (more than 256 kbit/s). All fixed connections via DSL, cable or satellite were counted here, but not those connected to the internet via mobile communications.

Largest telecommunications providers in South Korea

(data referring to the year 2022)


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