BT Broadband

British Telecom (BT) is the UK’s largest internet supplier, with live connections in over 9 million homes. BT also offers a range of phone and TV deals, providing as a great choice for anyone wishing to bundle multiple services together with one provider. Let’s take a look.

Overview  

Average Download Speeds	6Mbps – 900Mbps
Average Upload Speeds	1Mbps – 110Mbps
Broadband Type	ADSL & Fibre (FTTC/FTTP)
Home Phone line-rental	Yes
TV/Entertainment Bundles	Yes
Prices From	£24.99 per month

BT broadband deals and speeds

BT’s base broadband package – a standard ADSL connection – has average download speeds of 10Mbps. This would be an ideal choice for individuals or smaller families who use the internet for little more than checking emails and general web browsing. ADSL connections rely on copper phone lines running from the exchange to your home, and therefore not only require an active phone line, but are often slower when compared with fibre broadband.

The next options on from the standard are BT’s Fibre to the Cabinet (FTTC) packages. With FTTC, copper cables are still required to deliver your broadband, but less is used – only from the cabinet in the street to your home. Because of this, FTTC broadband generally provides a faster and more reliable connection than ADSL. BT’s FTTC packages have three options:- ‘Fibre Essentials’ with average download speeds of 36Mbps, ‘Fibre 1’ with speeds of 50Mbps, and ‘Fibre 2’ with average download rates of 67Mbps.

With download speeds of 36Mbps, BT’s entry-level fibre package, ‘Fibre Essentials’, is able to support three-to-four devices accessing the connection at once, and for activities such as streaming content in standard definition or downloading large files while working from home.

The next fibre package, the ‘Fibre 1’ gives average download speeds of 50Mbps. The difference between the Fibre 1 and the Fibre Essentials package is negligible in terms of both price and download speed, but again, is a good option for a household of four wanting to access the internet at once for slightly heavier tasks than just browsing the internet.

BT’s fastest option in this tier, the ‘Fibre 2’ has average speeds of 67Mbps and is ideal for larger households (5+), and those who enjoy gaming online or streaming TV shows and movies in HD.

BT Full Fibre (FTTP)

Although not yet widely available across the UK, BT has begun to rollout its ultrafast full fibre, or ‘Fibre to the Premises’ (FTTP) broadband. The main difference when compared with Fibre to the Cabinet (FTTC) packages is that full fibre uses only fibre optic cables, providing users with incredibly-fast and reliable broadband.

BT offers four FTTP options: Full Fibre 100, 300, 500 and 900. As each option name might suggest, download speeds range from 100Mbps all the way up to 900Mbps. These speeds are all exceptionally fast and ideal for families with numerous devices, those wanting the chance to stream in 4K, as well those who consider themselves serious online gamers.

Upload speeds

BT’s standard ADSL broadband package has an average upload speed of 1Mbps.

For their fibre packages, both the Fibre Essentials and Fibre 1 options have average upload speeds of 9.5Mbps, while the BT Fibre 2 averages more than double at 19.5Mbps.

Full fibre customers will notice significantly faster upload speeds with 30Mbps (Fibre 100), 50Mbps (Fibre 300), 73Mbps (Fibre 500), and 110Mbps (Fibre 900) offered. The faster upload speeds here may be of particular benefit for anyone who is working from home and regularly uploads and sends larger files.

Contract length

All BT’s broadband and TV packages are contracted for 24 months.

Home phone packages

BT now includes phone line rental in the cost of your broadband package. If you want to use your phone to make calls, Pay As You Go is set as standard, with costs of 22.84p per minute for calls to UK landlines and mobiles.

Optional extras such as 700 minutes, Unlimited minutes and International calls can be added for an additional fee.

TV Bundles

If you’re looking to bundle in a TV deal with your broadband package, BT offers a range of options:-

Package	Includes	Price per month
Entertainment	Sky Atlantic, AMC, NOW Entertainment and Netflix membership	£6.00 (on offer until 30/09/2022)
Sport	BT Sport Channels, AMC	£16.00
Big Sports	BT Sport Channels, NOW Sports Membership, Eurosport, AMC	£41.00
Big Entertainment	NOW Entertainment and Netflix Membership, NOW Cinema Membership, AMC	£27.00
VIP	All NOW Entertainment, Cinema and Sports Memberships, Netflix, BT Sport Channels, Eurosport, AMC	£74.00

Router

BT provides all new customers with a free router, but the type of router you will receive will depend on the broadband package you select.

The BT Smart Hub comes bundled with the Fibre Essential, Fibre 1 and Fibre 2 packages.

Meanwhile, BT’s full fibre packages has the BT Smart Hub 2 which comes complete with seven antennas to extend the wireless coverage throughout your home and a smart scanner which means it continually checks your network connection and will restart if there’s an issue.

Installation

BT charges a one off installation fee of £29.99 across all its broadband packages. If you’d prefer to go for a broadband plan that waives its installation fees, you may want to compare what other providers have to offer.

For either BT’s standard ADSL or fibre broadband packages, installation times are set at an average of two weeks. 

Customer service

BT customer service is available 8am – 9pm weekdays, and 8am – 8pm on weekdays and bank holidays. Technical support is available to all BT customers 24/7.

According to a customer service report conducted by Ofcom in May 2022, BT scored a total of 88% in overall customer satisfaction and 86% in broadband reliability.

Pros and cons

Pros

Package and bundle choices:-

BT offers a comprehensive choice of broadband packages that can be bundled with both home phone and TV options to suit a wide range of customers. Choosing to bundle these services can also save you money on your monthly bill.

Broadband is widely available:-

As the UK’s largest broadband provider, the prospect that you’ll be eligible for a BT broadband package is very high.

Cons

Losing to competitors in full-fibre:-

It was recently announced that Vodafone has overtaken BT to become the nation’s largest full fibre broadband provider. With already limited availability, BT announced it has reduced its focus on providing Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) services across the UK. This means that if you are interested in moving over to a faster and more reliable Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) service, you may need to look elsewhere other than BT.