The Federal Network Agency publishes data on the availability of permanently installed broadband connections in Germany twice a year in the Broadband Atlas. The latest post shows better availability of FTTH/FTTB connections – but some of the previous goals have not yet been achieved.
Gigabit fiber to about a third of private households
In the associated press release, the Federal Network Agency said that as of December 2023, “one in three households” now have access to gigabit fiber connections with FTTH or at least FTTB — which is roughly achieved with 32.1 percent availability. Compared to the previous half year, this represents an increase of approximately 4 percentage points (previously: 28.2 percent). If other communication technologies such as HFC (Hybrid Fiber Coax) are also taken into account, approximately 75 percent of households have access to bandwidths of 1000 Mbit/s.
There are only minor improvements in availability for frequently reserved connections with 100 and 200 Mbit/s bandwidths. While the proportion of connections has risen slightly from 92.9 to 93.3 percent compared to mid-2023 and is therefore also widely available, connections that are twice as fast, currently around 85 percent (previously: 84.5 percent), remain more From everything that was withheld in the eighth budget.
Old goals continue to be demolished
A look at low-bandwidths sometimes reveals a serious shortfall in broad coverage: The then-federal government's goal nearly a decade ago of giving all households Internet access at speeds of at least 50 megabits per second has not yet been achieved. The original target for implementation as part of the “Digital Agenda” was 2018, but this has not been even remotely achieved.
In the 2020 Broadband Atlas (data as of mid-2019), roughly 10 percent of households were listed for which this bandwidth was not available, and the most recent set of data shows roughly 96.2 percent availability; However, this means that approximately 4 percent of households are still cut off from the Internet with modern transmission rates. The increase compared to the previous half year was less than 0.3 percentage points, so the improvement for those affected appears to be coming only slowly. Worse still: for about 1.2% of households, there is not even enough for a 16 Mbit/s connection.
Available for businesses, schools and hospitals
In addition to private homes, the Broadband Atlas also lists the availability of broadband connections for schools, hospitals and businesses. The figures for businesses are very similar to those for private households and are usually only 1 to 2 percent worse at the upper end of the range.
But for schools and hospitals, things look a little different. Especially at the lower end, both are much worse off than private households, with approximately 4% of schools and approximately 3.5% of hospitals not having access to connections at a speed as low as 16 Mbit/s. On the other hand, if you set 50 Mbit/s as a target, there are up to 6.5 percent of schools and hospitals that are not provided with fast enough internet.
Map view, historical datasets, and new analysis tools
The Broadband Atlas is available to the public through the Federal Network Agency. There you will find datasets up to mid-2022, which can be used to track semi-annual changes. An interactive map display is also provided. However, the new analysis tools explicitly mentioned in the current press release with access to more in-depth data down to individual address data are reserved for unspecified “specific user groups.”
Lifelong foodaholic. Professional twitter expert. Organizer. Award-winning internet geek. Coffee advocate.