Akamai: 2Q ’16 State of the Internet Report
The global average connection speed increased 14% from year to year, but 7 of the top 10 US states’ average connection speed declined this quarter, according to Akamai’s “Second Quarter, 2016 State of the Internet Report” released on September 29. Moreover, none reached the FCC’s new 25 Mbps broadband threshold. Every quarter since 2008, Akamai Technologies, Inc. has collected information from their globally distributed Akamai Intelligent Platform to gather data on Internet connection speeds, network connectivity, IPv4 adoption speeds and more.
Global
Akamai found a 1% global decrease in the number of unique IPv4 addresses, at 800 million, connecting to their platform. How does this compare to previous quarters? It’s about 8 million fewer than in Q1 ‘16. However, approximately two-thirds of the surveyed countries had a higher number of unique IPv4 addresses in Q2 compared to this quarter last year. Yet in Q4 ‘15, that number was 810 million. While the global average connection speed decreased 2.3% in Q2 to 6.1Mbps, the global average peak connection speed increased 3.7% to 36.0 Mbps, a 2.5% increase year-over-year. All of the top 10 countries saw an increase in average connection speed in Q1 2016, yet nine of the top 10 countries saw speeds decrease in Q2. 53 of the 148 qualifying countries saw quarterly increases in average connection speed—which is lower than the 142 in Q1. South Korea maintained the highest connection speed in the world at 27.0 Mbps and Singapore maintained the highest average peak connection speed at 157.3 Mbps.
US
In comparison, 7 of the top 10 US states’ average connection speed declined—a complete reverse from previous quarters. Like Q1 ’16, all 10 states reached average connection speeds over 15 Mbps, however none reached the FCC’s new 25 Mbps broadband threshold. Idaho had the slowest connection speed in the country at 10.2 Mbps, down 6.4% from last quarter. While all states experienced an average connection speed gain in Q1 ’16, only 14 states saw quarterly gains in Q2 ’16. The District of Columbia continued to hold the top spot for average peak connection speed at 95.5 Mbps, a 2.7% quarterly increase. Arkansas had the lowest average peak connection speed at 46.3 Mbps, a 0.6% quarterly loss. Nineteen states saw quarterly connection speed declines, compared to only one in Q1 ’16. All states experienced positive year-over year-changes in Q2.
Broadband Adoption
Regarding global 4 Mbps broadband, adoption was up 4.3% to 76% in the second quarter. Andorra had the highest level of 4 Mbps adoption worldwide at 97%. For the US, eight out of the top 10 states saw declines in 4 Mbps broadband adoption—a complete reverse from Q1 when all 10 states saw gains. For 10 Mbps broadband, the global adoption rate grew to 35%, a 0.7% increase. While year-over-year changes in 10 Mbps broadband adoption was positive for all US states, 43 states saw their 10 Mbps rates drop from Q1 to Q2. The global 15 Mbps and 25 Mbps adoption rates each fell to 21% and 8.3%, respectfully. The 15 Mbps adoption rate for the US also experienced losses—40 states experienced negative growth. However, the 25 Mbps adoption rate was mixed for the US. Nineteen states experienced gains (compared to forty-eight in Q1) yet the 25 Mbps adoption rates continued to steadily improve year-to-year. South Korea continued to hold the top global spot in the 10, 15 and 25 Mbps broadband tiers with adoption rates of 79%, 63% and 37%, respectfully.
The report was divided geographically and broken down via the following sections: average connection speed, average peak connection speed, 4 Mbps broadband adoption, 10 Mbps broadband adoption, 15 Mbps broadband adoption and 25 Mbps broadband adoption. For the entire report, follow the link here.
