Fastest broadband UK: Hyperoptic, Post Office and Zen all top Broadband Genie’s speed charts

26 Feb 2020

Victoria Woollaston

Hyperoptic has been named the fastest broadband provider in the UK in the annual Broadband Genie home broadband awards

Broadband Genie has revealed the winners – and losers – in its annual home broadband awards and one broadband provider reigned supreme.

Analysis of 91,000 speed tests, carried out between 1 January to 3 December 2019, found Hyperoptic provides an average download speed of 211Mbits/sec and an average upload speed of 166Mbits/sec – faster than any other ISP tested.

In fact, Hyperoptic’s 211Mbits/sec was an impressive 42.6Mbit/sec faster than runner-up Vodafone, which isn’t that far off the total download speed of 76.5Mbits/sec offered by EE.

For the first time, the results were split into speed categories; Standard, Superfast and Ultrafast. The criteria for each category was:

Standard Broadband

Up to 24Mbit/sec download
Up to 1Mbit/sec upload

Superfast Broadband

Up to 80Mbit/sec download
Up to 20Mbit/sec upload

Ultrafast Broadband

Above 80Mbit/sec download
Above 20Mbit/sec upload

As a result, Hyperoptic wasn’t the only ISP to be recognised for its performance during 2019, though.

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Zen Internet won the award for fastest downloads in the superfast and standard broadband categories, while Sky Broadband was awarded for having the quickest superfast broadband upload speed, and Post Office won an award for its standard broadband upload speed.
The full list of winner is as follows:

Fastest Ultrafast Broadband Provider (Downloading): Hyperoptic
Fastest Ultrafast Broadband Provider (Uploading): Hyperoptic
Fastest Superfast Broadband Provider (Downloading): Zen Internet
Fastest Superfast Broadband Provider (Uploading): Sky
Fastest Standard Broadband Provider (Downloading): Zen Internet
Fastest Standard Broadband Provider (Uploading): Post Office

“Hyperoptic offers a future-proof service for anyone lucky enough to be able to receive Fibre To The Premises (FTTP),” said Alex Tofts, Broadband Expert at Broadband Genie. “But while these ultrafast speeds are impressive, FTTP coverage is limited so it’s also important to highlight the other winners in our speed awards.

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“ADSL, Virgin Media, or Openreach FTTC broadband is capable of handling the needs of many households and is available to the majority of premises.”

Separating the speed results into categories has not only allowed Broadband Genie to highlight a wider range of providers, it also gives a more accurate representation of the state of broadband in 2020.

The test results and categories were defined in collaboration with BroadbandUK. The tables showing where the other ISPs appeared are below.

Standard broadband

Downloading		Uploading
Provider	Speed (Mbit/sec)	Provider	Speed (Mbit/sec)
Zen Internet	8.3	Post Office	0.55
Sky	7.7	Zen Internet	0.530
EE	7.4	Plusnet	0.527
Plusnet	7.1	Sky	0.523
BT	6.7	EE	0.519
Post Office	6.59	TalkTalk	0.50
TalkTalk	6.58	BT	0.47
Origin	3.9	Origin	0.39

Superfast broadband

Downloading		Uploading
Provider	Speed (Mbit/sec)	Provider	Speed (Mbit/sec)
Zen Internet	38.5	Sky	11.9
BT	34.7	Zen Internet	11.5
Virgin Media	34.2	Gigaclear	11.2
Hyperoptic	33.6	BT	10.9
Sky	33.4	TalkTalk	10.0
Plusnet	30.6	Plusnet	9.9
TalkTalk	30.22	EE	9.7
EE	30.17	Vodafone	9.1
Post Office	28.8	Post Office	8.8
Origin	26.9	Origin	8.4
Vodafone	26.0	Virgin Media	7.7
Gigaclear	15.3	Hyperoptic	5.6

Ultrafast broadband

Downloading		Uploading
Provider	Speed (Mbit/sec)	Provider	Speed(Mbit/sec)
Hyperoptic	211.0	Hyperoptic	165.6
Vodafone	168.4	Gigaclear	139.5
Virgin Media	156.1	Vodafone	136.1
Gigaclear	142.5	Zen Internet	105.1
TalkTalk	140.3	TalkTalk	95.7
Zen Internet	138.1	BT	37.9
BT	102.7	EE	31.4
Sky	96.1	Sky	27.6
EE	76.5	Virgin Media	22.7