Telecommunication in the United Kingdom
The development of telecommunications in the United Kingdom is roughly equivalent to the average of the
European Union. Under the country code +44, there were a total of 110.90 million connections in 2019. Among them were 78.92 million million mobile phones, which corresponds to an average of 1.2 per person. In the EU, this figure is 1.2 mobile phones per person.
In the expansion of broadband Internet connections the United Kingdom is very well in the race. Around 93% of all residents have access to the Internet. Approximately 40% have their own fast Internet connection, which is at least faster than the previous ISDN (more than 2048 kbit/s).
With about 8.11 million webhosts, the United Kingdom is below the world's average by population.
Back to overview: United KingdomDevelopment of telephone and internet connections
With an average download speed of 80.91 Mbit/second for fixed-network broadband internet, the United Kingdom ranked 47th in an international comparison. The upload rate of only 23.69 Mbit/second was significantly lower (75th place). The quality of the Internet, consisting of signal fluctuations (jitter) and latency, is very far ahead at 13th place.
In
mobile internet, i.e. on tablets and smartphones, the United Kingdom comes 32nd with a download speed of 53.17 Mbit/second. The upload speed of around 11 Mbit was enough for 86th place.
The "Speedtest Global Index" published regularly by Ookla is based on several million individual measurements in November 2020 from 176 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% mean that, on average, every inhabitant has more than one connection.
Access to the Internet in the United Kingdom from 1990 - 2019
Broadband internet in the United Kingdom 2000 - 2019
Landlines 1990 - 2019
Mobile phones 1990 - 2019