The UFC-Que Choisir has published the results of its exclusive observatory of fixed Internet speeds. This is a negative result since we are very far from the operators' promises at 500 Mb/s, 1 Gb/s and even 10 Gb/s.

 

Even if subscribers are not fooled, the gap between the ads and reality is so large that it becomes absurd. This observatory therefore makes it possible to take stock of the Internet speeds that the French really benefit from and to draw three lessons from them.

 

1. Real flows light years away from those promised

 

Most operators offer their connected customers "up to 20 megabits/s" in ADSL. When we're barely at 8 Mbps actually. For Very High Speed, the gap is even higher. The actual average throughput is rather around 175 Mb/s while operators report 500 Mb or even 1 Gb per second.

 

Of course, these figures are only averages and they depend on other factors for which operators are not necessarily responsible. Nevertheless, the gap with the promised flow is gigantic.

 

2. 2 to 5 times lower flow in rural areas

 

The data from the observatory are unquestionable: the smaller the municipality, the lower the average flow rate. In ADSL, the difference ranges from a simple to a double: from an average of 9.1 Mb/s in cities with more than 30,000 inhabitants to 5.2 Mb/s in villages with less than 1,000 inhabitants.

 

The gap is even more obvious for Very High Speed connections. On average, 284 Mbps is surfed in large cities when an average speed of less than 100 Mbps is sufficient in municipalities with less than 3,000 inhabitants. And, it drops to 49 Mb/s in towns with less than 1,000 inhabitants.

 

3. Fiber optics, there's nothing better

 

The fact that the differences between cities and rural areas in terms of Very High Speed Internet access are so large is largely due to the technologies used. The inhabitants of large cities are mainly connected by FTTH (fibre to the subscriber). But those in small municipalities and villages too often have to be satisfied with less efficient solutions such as VDSL. While this improved ADSL theoretically allows a throughput of 100 Mb/s, it suffers a very high signal loss and only customers residing less than 1 km from the connection node can benefit from a higher throughput than ADSL.

 

In medium-sized cities, a significant number of subscribers are also connected via FTTB (Fiber to the building, or cable). While it is largely sufficient for the majority of Internet users, this technology suffers from a few defects such as a lower upload rate or a longer latency time.

 

 

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Source : UFC-Que Choisir