November 20, 2024 by Joe Ross
Yesterday, I reported on the new FCC update for fixed broadband service as of June 30, 2024. I noted the impressive increase in competition at 100 Mbps down and 20 Mbps up and the substantial increase in licensed and licensed-by-rule wireless service. The major providers were very busy in the first half of the year, with T-Mobile, Verizon, and AT&T all adding some impressive wireless service and the cable and fiber providers adding substantial fiber service. AT&T saw a massive 76.4 percent increase in its locations served by wireless – from 9.5 million to 16.8 million while competitors T-Mobile and Verizon saw a 17.3 percent (+ 6.8M) and 8.6 percent (+2.5M) increase.
The data show cable’s continued embrace of fiber with Comcast increasing its fiber position over 45 percent (+180k) and Charter adding nearly 19 percent (+240k) to its end-of-2023 footprint. But AT&T added the most fiber locations overall at over 718k (a 4.7 percent increase) with Frontier in second at 451k net adds (an impressive 9.1 percent growth). Meanwhile, AT&T and Frontier are still slowly dropping DSL support, reducing 2.6 and 5.0 percent respectively and representing over 550k and 140k locations respectively. The table at the end of this post provides all of the details.
Taking a deeper look at the wireless speeds offered, while AT&T’s growth is impressive, it’s overwhelmingly at 25/3 Mbps – only 11 percent of its wireless offerings are at 100/20 Mbps. Verizon, on the other hand, offers 100/20 Mbps at 60 percent of its wireless locations versus 47 percent of T-Mobile’s. Overall, T-Mobile now has a slight advantage over Verizon in total locations served at 100/20 Mbps (21.9M vs. 19.1M) due to their substantial growth in 100/20 Mbps service in the first half of the year. At the end of 2023, Verizon had 16 million 120/20 locations and T-Mobile trailed with 15 million. However, as shown in the figure below, Verizon offers roughly one-third of its wireless footprint at below 25/3 Mbps, while T-Mobile’s all exceeds 25/3. Detailed figures are provided in a table at the end of this post.
For those of you familiar with the FCC provider summary reports, you’ll notice that there are differences between Televate’s numbers and the FCC’s for some providers. Televate excludes locations where the FCC data shows download and upload speeds of zero megabits per second. The FCC instructs ISPs to use 0/0 Mbps when they serve locations at speeds below 10 Mbps down and 1 Mbps up, and includes those locations among the total served. However, they could offer service as low as 200 kbps down and 200 kbps. T-Mobile and AT&T offer service below 10/1 Mbps for a substantial number of their reported locations. While the FCC provides more granular service levels on its national map, the raw data available to the public excludes these details. Televate has chosen to exclude these locations in our reporting as we feel 200 kbps service (for example) is not usable for mass market broadband service. The FCC reports T-Mobile as offering business service at 76 million business locations and residential service at 71 million residential locations. So, there are at least 30 million T-Mobile locations nationwide with service below 10/1 Mbps. AT&T reports offering DSL service to 25 million residential and business locations, and therefore, about 5 million locations are served with DSL below 10/1. Note also that Televate’s statistics represent the net locations. The FCC numbers cannot be added to determine the net locations as T-Mobile and AT&T offers business and residential service at most locations.
Click here to find out more about Televate’s Broadband Reports, to download a free nationwide report, or to request a free state or county report. And, if you have any feedback (or thoughts on this zero Mbps issue), please share them in the comments!
Major ISP Service by Technology 12/23 and 6/24
Wireless Provider Service Location Count by Service Level
