London-focused broadband ISP CommunityFibre has become the first provider in the UK to launch a symmetric speed 3Gbps (3000Mbps+) package for homes, which is now the fastest available speed being offered to residential customers covered by their new network in the capital city (over 100,000 premises).
Before we get started it’s necessary to point out that this isn’t the fastest home broadband package available in the UK, that honour goes to B4RN’s 10Gbps service and they’re matched by the much more niche Black Fibre (part of the Telcom Group). Zzoomm also comes close with their 2Gbps plan, albeit with slower uploads, but otherwise most Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) networks have made 1Gbps their top tier.
NOTE: CF’s covers parts of 12 London boroughs (mostly social housing) including Barnet, Brent, City of London, Croydon, Lewisham, Newham, Richmond upon Thames, Southwark, Sutton, Tower Hamlets, Wandsworth and Westminster.
As you’d expect the new 3Gbps package is a pricey affair (albeit not if you consider how many Megabits you’re getting) and will set customers back £99 per month on a 24-month contract term. In order to support all of that speed they’ve also paired the package with a WiFi 6 (802.11ax) capable router from ZyXEL (we’re currently trying to identify the model), which can handle multi-Gigabit connections.
The ISP is also including a free installation and pledges that their prices will be “locked for the duration of the contract.” Furthermore, as part of Community Fibre’s mission to bring better broadband to “all Londoners“, free 3Gbps access will be provided to some of the community centres in the London boroughs they operate in.
Jon Bonner, Community Fibre customer in Southwark, said:
“The 3 Gigafast package is brilliant; it’s faster, more reliable and has allowed me to have a stable connection on all of my devices. I have about 25-30 devices in my home, some are WiFi 6 enabled such as the Samsung S20. It may sound like a lot, but when each member of the household has several devices each – phones, tablets, tv’s, streaming dongles, smart wearables, and of course laptops, we really need a fast connection that can handle this. With the 3 Gigafast package, I don’t have to worry about new devices slowing down my connection, it’s been great!”.
The provider is currently working to cover 1 million homes and businesses with their FTTP network by the end of 2023, which is being supported by around £500m of private investment (here). The vast majority of this has so far been focused upon the London area and large residential apartment buildings (MDUs) or office blocks.
As welcome as it is to see a 3Gbps package emerge, much of this is arguably more about bragging rights and marketing because the vast majority of people wouldn’t be able to take full advantage of 1Gbps today (slow WiFi, misc. hardware limits and the various bottlenecks of remote internet services etc.), let alone 3Gbps or 10Gbps. But demand is always rising and CF are showing that they’ll have no trouble staying ahead of the curve.
Not so long ago the only way you could have accessed this kind of performance would have been to pay through the nose for a very expensive leased line.
