Amvia Blog - Business Voice & Data Resources

FTTC Speeds

Written by Nathan Hill-Haimes | 16-Mar-2018 18:02:51

If you are reading this article you may already have FTTC and want more speed, or you may have ADSL and be thinking about how you can upgrade the capability of your business broadband. In this article you can learn about how fast FTTC is, how distance affects FTTC speed and how you can improve the speed of FTTC.

How fast can FTTC download data?

You can order Fibre to the Cabinet (FTTC) with three different download speeds:

  • 80Mbps Download
  • 55Mbps Download
  • 40Mbps Download

The maximum throughput you will achieve is slightly less than these download speeds though; you should not expect to get more than 76Mbps / 52Mbps and 38 Mbps respectively.

How fast can FTTC upload data?

There are four different FTTC upload speeds you can order:

  • 20Mbps Upload with the 80Mbps Download service
  • 10Mbps Upload with the 55Mbps Download service
  • 10Mbps Upload with the 40Mbps Download service
  • 2Mbps Upload with the 40Mbps Download service

Unfortunately, you are not guaranteed to receive the FTTC speed that you order, that's because FTTC speed is distance dependent.

FTTC Speed & Distance

The speed of FTTC that you can expect to receive is determined by the distance between your business location and the street level cabinet that is providing your FTTC service. As can be seen in the diagram below, the relationship is linear, the nearer you are to the cabinet, the faster the speed you will receive.

FTTC Speed Estimates

We have collated the following speed data to help you estimate the FTTC speed you are likely to receive.

Download Speeds & The Effect Of Distance

 

Upload Speeds & The Effect Of Distance

 

Increase FTTC Speed

Do you need to increase your FTTC speed? If so there are a few options available.

FTTC is a shared bandwidth service, what this means is that during busy times when the network is congested your FTTC speed could slow down. 

Between cabinet and exchange Openreach guarantee 20Mb per 40Mb FTTC customer and 30Mb per 80Mb FTTC customer, and add additional capacity between cabinet and exchange in 1Gb increments as required.

If you can't accept this risk then you need a dedicated bandwidth service such as EFM, a leased line or ethernet. If you are happy to share bandwidth you can still increase the capability of your FTTC.

  • You could bond 2 or 3 FTTC connections together, this is known as FTTC bonding.
  • You could ask your provider to apply G.Fast to your line. G Fast is a new type of technology applied to the copper line enabling fibre speeds over copper wires.

Amvia are a business only ISP with a team of FTTC experts ready to help you. If you already have FTTC and need more speed we can work through the options available to you. If you are considering FTTC we can discuss your needs and match this with the appropriate solution.