Nearly two-thirds of UK homes have access to superfast broadband

Latest reports from Ofcom reveal growing appetite for superfast connections in the UK

Superfast broadband is now available to almost three-quarters (73 per cent) of UK Homes, Ofcom has revealed in their annual Infrastructure Report.

Superfast broadband is now available to almost three-quarters (73 per cent) of UK Homes, Ofcom has revealed in their annual Infrastructure Report.

Twenty-two per cent of households (around 4.8 million customers) have signed up to superfast connections (defined as download speeds in excess of 28MBps) up from 10 per cent (2.1 million) last year.

The report also showed that the number of public Wi-Fi spots has increased, more than doubling in the last year from 16,000 to 34,000.

The amount of data transmitted over these hotspots has also increased – almost trebling from 0.7million gigabytes a month in 2012 to just under 2m GBs in 2013.

However, Ofcom’s first ever analysis of mobile coverage on UK roads found whilst coverage for voice-only networks (2G) was good on motorways, there were significant gaps in coverage on A and B roads, especially when it came to 3G.

The report indicated that only 35 per cent of A and B roads were covered by all four 3G networks, whilst nine per cent had no 3G coverage at all. Ofcom predicts that this deficit will be partly met by the continued roll-out of 4G services in the coming year.

Commenting on the findings, Ofcom’s chief executive Ed Richards said: “Superfast broadband is rolling out fast across the country, and 4G mobile will reach at least 98% of the population. This is really good news but there remain considerable challenges, not least in hard-to-reach areas for mobile and home internet services”