May 29th, 2007
U.S. BroadBand Average an Abysmal 1.9Mbps
By Michael Santo
Executive Editor, RealTechNews
I suppose I should be happy with what I have, but still. Generally I get 5Mbps and sometimes up to 12Mbps from Comcast. But compared to average speeds of 61Mbps from Japan and 7.6Mbps from Canada … it’s really annoying.
The organization conducted its own download/upload speed tests online, which were taken by roughly 67,000 people across the country, and concluded that the average download speed in the US was 1.9Mbps. According to CWA president Larry Cohen, “the results are deeply troubling.”
The data, says the CWA, is in in stark contrast to broadband speeds available in other countries. The organization compared its own survey data to numbers provided by the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation’s “Assessing Broadband in America” (PDF) report, which showed that countries such as Japan and even our closest neighbor of Canada have significantly higher broadband download speeds—61Mbps and 7.6Mbps, respectively. Source: Ars Technica
We Say: Well, of course, if you ask someone else you get different numbers. The ITIF report, which gives the Canadian and Japanese numbers, says the US average is 4.8Mbps. That doesn’t really make me less annoyed, when I notice that besides Japan at 61 there’s Korea at 45.6Mbps (now we know why they love MMORPGs). 
Charles says:
4.8Mbps… Ha! I wish.
I lope along on 1.1Mbps while the traffic lights in my city operate on a fiber optic network installed a decade ago.
WooHoo!
May 29th, 2007 at 12:19 pm
Wesley says:
You’re lucky! I live in a rural area at about the “end of the line” for DSL. 1.5Mbps advertised ends up running at 864k. There are many folks in my area who can’t get anything but dial-up! I don’t think Japan has any rural areas….
May 29th, 2007 at 12:39 pm
Brandenburg says:
To be honest, I’m content with the 6Mbps downlink I have (and actually usually achieve a solid 5) with Time Warner, but the anemic 384K UP speed is the aspect that hardest to swallow. While clearly in place to discourage sharing, it’s still a thorn in my side.
May 29th, 2007 at 1:06 pm
Another Mike says:
I’m with you Brandenburg. My 8Mbps is fine enough for me. I went ahead and spent the extra money but really only because I thought that it said that I’d get a boost in my upload speed as well. Although sharing is nice and all I just want to be able to access my computer with a decent connection anywhere. I need my ftp and remote desktop to do my job but the lousy 384kbps is really really slow.
May 29th, 2007 at 3:14 pm
Bill King says:
Australia’s so slow it’s not even on the list
May 29th, 2007 at 3:55 pm
sliknik says:
Well here in Guyana we get a magnificent 256k down and 100k up DSL.
And our phone company only allows us to pay US$50 per month for that privilege.
512k is US$150 per month.
May 29th, 2007 at 6:07 pm
Nico says:
In South Africa the picture looks like this: ADSL goes up to 1mbps (4mbps is in the pipeline), but that is at a cost of over US$150 per month with a 3GB cap. It is however very close between the advertised speed and what you really get. 3G/HSDPA is advertised at 1.8mbps, but you typically get around 600kbps - cost is around US$50 per 1GB.
ADSL is available mainly in the metro areas, while 3G/HSDPA penetrates into a couple of rural areas - although limited.
Typical wait time to get ADSL set-up is around 6 weeks, while 3G/HSDPA is available automatically on all mobile contracts (pay as you use model), or as a package which takes 24 hours to activate (which is what I described above).
May 29th, 2007 at 7:42 pm
John Corliss says:
Main reason for the U.S. slow connection speeds is that providers want to slowly jack the speed up and charge (even) more for it, describing the slightly higher speeds as “premium service” or the like. You can’t do that if you start out at full capability.
Ah, capitalistic greed at its finest.
May 30th, 2007 at 3:40 am
John says:
Don’t forget we paid the phone companies billions in tax breaks to give us ‘fiber to the curb’ and in return we got DSL. I don’t know about you, but I hated them BEFORE that now it’s even worse. LOL.
May 30th, 2007 at 3:28 pm
Ed E. says:
I love hearing you guys bitch about 1.9MBps when 52% of households in the US only have dial up available.
That’s the real shame in this.
September 24th, 2007 at 5:13 am