Latest statistics have just been released from Statistics NZ and it makes exciting reading for us broadband fans here at Broadband Compare. The stats are AMAZING! Fibre connection numbers, speeds and unlimited data plans are all increasing rapidly as Kiwis keep up their hunger for awesome connectivity!
The latest stats show that the number of active fibre broadband connections in New Zealand reached 397,000 in the year ended June 2017. That is up 67 per cent from the June 2016 year. Fibre broadband connections now make up more than twenty percent (21 per cent) of all broadband connections within New Zealand. By comparison, the previous year there was only 12 per cent on fibre, according to the results of Statistics NZ's annual Internet Service Provider survey.
Lots and lots of households are moving to fibre because the way that households are consuming data is changing. A good fibre broadband connection allows for several people to be watching movies and playing video games at the same time without any ill effects like buffering and loading delays.
What is most exciting is that this number is just going to keep growing. The ultra fast fibre broadband rollout is continuing and the programme aims to have 87 per cent of New Zealanders able to access fibre by the end of 2022. If we were being fussy, it’s that the numbers aren’t as high as we’d like. There are now nearly 1.2 million households and businesses that are able to connect to the fibre network and so far only one-third of them have taken up the option. What are you waiting for? If you are one of the 800,000 with better broadband already, then get involved. Just check your address in 10 seconds at Broadband Compare and see if you can get fibre.
Broadband connections consumed 276 million gigabytes of data in the month of June 2017, Stats NZ said. This was a 93 per cent increase from June 2016. This means that residential broadband connections in New Zealand are now using an average of around 170 gigabytes each per month (June 2017), compared with 88 gigabytes the previous year.
As a reflection of this, the proportion of broadband connections classified as unlimited (i.e. with no data cap, increased to 62 per cent by 30 June 2017. Residential connections with a data cap of 100 gigabytes or more have increased 171 per cent since 30 June 2016.
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