
Telecommunication in the United Kingdom
Compared to the United States, the United Kingdom is at the forefront of the development of telecommunications. Under the country code +44, there were a total of 111.97 million connections in 2021. Among them were 79.77 million mobile phones, which corresponds to an average of 1.2 per person. In the US, this figure is 1.1 mobile phones per person.With about 8.11 million webhosts, the United Kingdom is below the world's average by population. At the end of 2020, 2.45 million of these, or about 30 percent, were secured with SSL or comparable encryption.
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Development of telephone and internet connections
With an average download speed of 71.14 Mbit/second for fixed-network broadband internet, the United Kingdom ranks 56th in an international comparison. The upload rate of only 19.67 Mbit/second was significantly lower (89th place).In mobile internet, i.e., on tablets and smartphones, the United Kingdom comes 40th with a download speed of 49.13 Mbit/second. The upload speed of around 7 Mbit was only enough for 121st 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 the United Kingdom from 1990 - 2020
Broadband internet in the United Kingdom 2000 - 2021

Landlines 1990 - 2021
Mobile phones 1990 - 2021
Distribution in 2021 | United Kingdom Total | United Kingdom percent | USA Total | USA percent |
---|---|---|---|---|
Broadband users | 27.74 m | 41.20 % | 127.03 m | 38.27 % |
Landlines | 32.19 m | 47.81 % | 97.11 m | 29.26 % |
Mobile cellulars | 79.77 m | 118.49 % | 361.62 m | 108.96 % |