Compare the best broadband deals

Your guide to broadband packages

Dan Howdle

There are a decent number of people who know exactly what they want out of a new broadband deal, and exactly how to find it using our broadband comparison tools. For others, it's just a dizzying array of providers, packages, options, and speed numbers for which you have no point of reference. Which provider should you choose? Which speed? And how do you know? We have all the details.

Choosing a broadband deal

There are several major factors you'll need to consider when choosing a new broadband deal. The price, obviously, but also the speed you'll get, the provider and its reputation, how long you'll be tied into the contract and more. Here we'll take a look at those factors in more detail.

Monthly price – setting a budget

How much you pay should begin with understanding how much you're prepared to pay. Most of us will come to this with a budget in mind, but what you pay ultimately is tied to six main factors:

• Speed – Broadly speaking the faster the broadband, the more you will pay. However, this is not always the case comparing across different providers as each has its own pricing scale
• Provider – Each provider sets its pricing differently, depending on where it pitches itself in the general marketplace. That means the same broadband speed can be offered across a broad range of pricing from one provider to the next
• Contract length – Almost all broadband packages are either 18 or 24 months in length now. However, some providers do offer one-month rolling contracts, for which you will pay a premium either in terms of a hefty up-front cost (NOW Broadband), or an extraordinarily hefty monthly bill (Virgin Media)
• Package contents – Comparing like for like speed doesn't always tell you the whole story. For example, one package may be a few pounds more expensive than the other, offer the same speeds, but come with a wealth of extras like (for example) an internet security package, or phone line with anytime calls. You have to look at the detail to understand why things are priced as they are, but sometimes it just comes down to where a provider chooses to set its price
• Mid-contract price rises – Every broadband provider still currently raises its prices by inflation plus 3.8% every April 1. Ofcom, the telecoms regulator is cracking down on it as we speak, but until then, unless stated otherwise, you should expect this
• Special offers – Most broadband providers have intermittent offers running which can add anything from several months free, to a gift or reward card, to a free TV or games console. These sorts of offers are well worth seeking out and can add substantial value

Choosing a download speed

There are various ways of determining the right speed for you and your household. None of them will ever be dead accurate however, since getting the right speed is more art than science. That's because for most households, there will be long periods of the day and night where you could happily get by with 10Mbps, and others where you're hitting upper limits no matter how fast your broadband is – when downloading a new game, for example.

Broadly, our advice is to get the fastest thing you can get, if you or members of your household regularly download videogames, and for the budget conscious, get the fastest thing you can afford. For everyone else, the following rough guide should help.

Contract length

There's a lot less variety when it comes to the length of your contract than there used to be, with almost no 12-month contracts now available, a smattering of 18-month contracts still out there, and a wealth of 24-month contracts, with the latter becoming the new normal. BT started this trend of two-year contracts a couple of years ago, and extended it to the other brands it owns: EE Broadband and Plusnet. Subsequently, brands like Sky Broadband, NOW Broadband and Vodafone Broadband have followed BT's lead.

Suffice it to say we are not fans of these very long contracts becoming the norm, because there are no tangible benefits to you, the customer. Longer contracts are better only for providers, and that's that.

Choosing a provider

Obviously, being able to provide the speed you need at the right price, with a good quality router and reputable customer service are all factors connected to the provider you choose. Rather like the price you should be paying, choosing a provider is connected to every other factor in this section of the guide – or more to the point, understanding what you need out of your broadband package should help you choose a suitable provider.

Promotions and incentives

These are well worth keeping your ear to the ground for. You can see all the offers on right now by selecting the 'Deals with rewards and offers' filter in our comparison table. You'll usually see a range of different offer types.

Vouchers, gift cards, cashback and bill credit

Vouchers are just that: money-value tickets you can spend in specific stores – quite rare these days. Gift cards are the same, but come in the form of a card or electronically via a code. Cashback is usually supplied in the form of a 'reward card', which is essentially a pre-paid Mastercard you can spend anywhere. And finally, bill credit is where a designated amount comes off your first bills, so £100 bill credit on a £25 per month package would mean you get the first four months free.

Free gifts

An exclusive and rarer category, but you do still see deals like this pop up from time to time – usually on broadband and TV bundles. A free TV or games console have been the most recent of these, though in the past there have also been various smart home devices – Ring doorbells, smart speakers, bluetooth headphones and the like.

Black Friday

On Black Friday (the last Friday of November wherever that happened to sit), some providers will roll out their very best deals and offers. Is it worth waiting for Black Friday to choose a new broadband deal? No. Not really. The offers are sometimes marginally better, but not enough that sticking with an expensive or inadequate package while you wait is going to be offset. If you happen to be switching broadband provider around the end of November though, your chances of finding a great deal are going to be higher.

Haggling with your current provider

If your primary motivation for switching is to find a cheaper deal, but you're pretty happy with your current provider, calling them up to renegotiate a new contract at the end of your existing one can be a good idea. Here's what you need to do.

• Find a cheaper alternative package – Before calling, familiarise yourself with a couple of options that would make your existing package and speed cheaper if you got it from another provider. If you're threatening to switch if they don't give you a better deal they will ask you to which package you're threatening to switch to. Make sure you have an answer
• Call them – You will be put through to their retentions team most likely. They will tell you what deals are available to you if you re-contract
• Be prepared to walk away – If what they offer isn't as cheap or as good as what you could be switching to, be prepared to walk away. Thank your existing provider and tell them you are switching because they could not match the deal you found
• Actually switch – And here's the secret knowledge no one ever mentions. Te moment you sign up to a new provider your existing provider is notified. The last time we refused our existing provider's offer and went to switch, they were on the phone to us within five minutes with a much better offer. This won't always work, but bear in mind there is a difference between threatening to leave and actually leaving when it comes to how you are perceived by your existing provider

What our expert says...

"If you’re new to the world of broadband it can be a dizzying experience both understanding your own needs and matching those against the many, many packages available from a huge quantity of providers. If I were to offer one tip though it’s this: Get the fastest speed you can comfortably afford and you will never be far wrong."

Dan Howdle, Broadband and mobile expert

Broadband providers

Each provider attempts to find its own space in the market by angling their products in a specific way and with a specific aim. For example, Sky wants to be (and is) king of broadband and TV bundles, while EE Broadband is all about raw speed, gaming features and super-advanced routers. Here's a very brief rundown of the main providers you can compare on Cable.co.uk and what makes them unique.

• BT – Probably the best-known brand in the UK broadband market, BT's reputation these days is as an expensive, albeit premium, provider with a strong focus on mesh networks and unbreakable Wi-Fi (whole home coverage, speed guarantees, 4G backup)
• Sky – Sky is super-focused on providing the most tempting broadband and TV bundles, and it's succeeding. If you want TV and broadband from a single provider, Sky is it. Do remember though that Sky TV (Sky Stream) is available without Sky Broadband, so you can mix and match
• Virgin Media – Once the fastest widely available provider, 1.6Gbps packages from EE Broadband and Vodafone Broadband mean it holds that mantle no more. Still, if you can get it it remains a solid choice, with broadband up to 1.1Gbps and decent TV options
• Plusnet – Owned by BT for many years now, A+++ customer service is Plusnet's speciality, which it delivers via a raft of excellent, no-frills broadband packages
• TalkTalk – Not quite the 'budget' provider it seems to want to be anymore, TalkTalk sits mid-market price-wise, and also offers a good, cost-effective TV bundle
• NOW Broadband – Low prices, lower speeds, no credit checks. Sky's budget NOW brand keeps things simple and cheap with speeds up to 300Mbps. Don't expect anything to be remarkable, or excellent – more just expect it to work well and cost less
• Vodafone – Like EE Broadband (next), Vodafone wants to be the technical broadband king, offering the best router, best connectivity, fastest speeds. It does this through additional, higher-tier package levels such as 'Pro II'
• EE Broadband – Now has a Wi-Fi 7 router available on its faster packages. That is truly bleeding-edge stuff. And with speeds up to 1.6Gbps and some unique and utterly brilliant features for gamers, EE is winning the war it is choosing to wage
• Rebel – So new you've probably never heard of them – yet. We say yet because Rebel is a national provider. You can get it anywhere you can get BT, TalkTalk and all the rest. It's not the most competitively priced provider, but with that comes outstanding equipment, support and customer service
• Altnets (various) – There are also various altnets (alternative networks) that may pop up in our comparison when you enter your postcode. These smaller, more local providers tend to offer extremely fast Full Fibre speeds, so are well worth looking out for

Switching provider

It's never been simpler. So simple, in fact, it only needs this tiny section to take you through the entire process: Sign up to your new provider using our broadband comparison and literally every other aspect will be taken care of, including informing your existing provider you're leaving, setting an activation date, and providing you a more detailed take on the speeds you will get at your address.

So much of the process is automated these days and you won't suffer much or any downtime during the switching process. Your old provider will likely want their router back though, so be prepared for them to ask. And all of it starts with entering your postcode at the top of this page and finding out what you can get.

Speed and Wi-Fi guarantees

Many broadband providers now offer speed guarantees. These can be a little confusing from the outside because the terminology is so closely blended with so-called Wi-Fi guarantees. The two go hand-in-hand quite often, but they are different.

Speed guarantees

Providers like BT and Sky offer to guarantee a minimum speed your home will be getting at any given time. The minimum will depend on how fast your package is and how fast your connection is (connection speed and advertised speed are often not the same since advertised speeds are an average). The speed guarantee will pay out compensation if you find yourself below your minimum for a give period (usually a few days).

Wi-Fi guarantees

This is a promise to provide a minimum Wi-Fi speed in every room of your home, and is often an optional add-on. The add-on will usually provide you mesh Wi-Fi extenders to ensure your whole home is covered. Like the speed guarantee, if your provider fails to meet the minimum it sets you'll get some sort of cashback or bill credit as compensation.

Reviews

There is so much detail beneath the surface when it comes to each provider and the unique things offered by each. That's why we've created full, detailed reviews of each provider and the service they're offering. If you really want to get to the nitty-gritty detail, reading our provider reviews is the way to go. You can read all of our broadband provider reviews here.

Customer service

Ofcom keeps annual data on how the various providers are doing in terms of customer satisfaction. However, it only measures providers with more than 1.5% of the market share, and since the market is dominated by half a dozen or so major players, that means a lot of smaller providers are left out of the data. The following table shows how each of the main providers ranks in terms of overall satisfaction according to Ofcom, along with other notable details about the provider so you can compare them side by side.

Performance and reliability

How reliable your broadband provider is, and its performance in terms of delivering the service promised largely comes down to the type of broadband they're supplying and the network being used. For example, BT recently stated that there are 60% fewer faults on its Full Fibre network compared to its Standard Fibre network. Full Fibre is simply more robust and reliable than Standard FTTC Fibre or (shudder) ADSL.

And likewise, Virgin Media is more reliable than Standard Fibre on Openreach, and less reliable than Full Fibre because it uses a hybrid technology that's somewhere in the middle. Uptimes on all networks are generally in excess of 97-98% though, so in terms of reliability there's really not much in it. Gone are the old days where you connection would drop out a few times a week.

Availability

Like reliability, availability comes down to the type of broadband you want. There are three types as far as most of us are concerned (more if you include mobile, satellite, and so on, but those aren't relevant to most of us). Those types are Standard Fibre, Full Fibre and Cable (Virgin Media). If you're wondering what's happened to ADSL, it's no longer offered by most providers, though BT and one or two others will supply it to you, they will only do so if you can't get anything quicker. We have more on these broadband types in their own section further down, but for now here's a quick overview of their availability.

Broadband packages and bundles

There are now a wide variety of ways to get additional services with your broadband, but adding TV for example will narrow down the list of potential providers substantially, since only BT/EE (both offer EE TV), Sky, TalkTalk and Virgin Media offer TV bundles. There are other blends of services out there, though – it all depends on what you're looking for.

• Broadband only – Just broadband, nothing else
• Broadband and phone – Some packages come with a phone line, some don't. Those that do came with pay as you go calls and you can add a free calling package on top, while those that don't require you to add an entire phone package during the sign up process if you want one
• Broadband and TV – Sky, Virgin Media, BT or EE (both offering EE TV), or TalkTalk are your only option if you want TV with your broadband. Sky is the king, obviously, with its Sky Stream service towering over its competition, but the others are certainly worth looking into. Sky is the only TV provider that allows you to get TV on its own, so if you want BT Broadband and Sky TV for example you can absolutely have it
• Broadband, TV and phone – As the name suggests, it's broadband and TV with a phone line on top
• Bundles with a mobile SIM – Only Virgin Media, since merging with O2, offers broadband bundles that include a mobile SIM, but if you're in need of everything including the kitchen sink we heartily recommend them as they can save you a substantial amount of cash versus taking your services out separately

Types of broadband

Checking your postcode for what providers are available comes down to something more fundamental that whether you can get Sky, TalkTalk or whichever provider takes your fancy. What you can get is determined by the different types of broadband that currently co-exist in the UK and whether you can get them at your address. This determines everything: Providers, speeds, everything. So it's just as well that we briefly cover what they are.

• ADSL – Where broadband began, this type offers average speeds of around 10Mbps and arrives solely on the copper cables of the creaking and ancient telephone network currently being discontinued. Most providers no longer offer it and those that do will only show it as available if you're unlucky enough to live somewhere you can't get it
• Standard Fibre (FTTC) – This type is available everywhere (pretty much) and runs up to around 65Mbps average. It uses the old copper network from the cabinet to your house, while the rest is fibre, which on balance gives us these intermediate speeds
• Full Fibre (FTTP) – It's fibre optic throughout the entire network and is therefore capable of insane speeds. EE Broadband and Vodafone Broadband are currently offering packages up to 1.6Gbps (1,600 Mbps). And if you think that's a lot, consider that a single fibre line is theoretically capable of up to 44Tbps (44,000Gbps, or 44 million Mbps).
• Cable broadband (Virgin Media) – Virgin Media uses a hybrid cabling technology that neither Standard Fibre nor Full Fibre. It's a bit of both. Virgin Media has maxed out the capacity of this technology with its Gig1 packages, which is why its new Gig2 packages have such limited availability – they come on a brand new Full Fibre network that's only just beginning to roll out
• Mobile broadband – Provided you live somewhere with a good 4G or 5G signal, mobile broadband can be a good alternative to fixed line broadband. It uses a mobile network as your main connection, via a special router

Social tariffs

A social tariff is a low-cost, bare-bones broadband package for which you have to meet certain criteria as a benefits claimant in order to be able to buy. Most providers have one, but they don't go out of their way to advertise them.

Eligibility

To be eligible, you typically need to be receiving benefits such as Universal Credit, Pension Credit, Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA), Employment and Support Allowance (ESA), or Income Support. Each provider may have slightly different eligibility requirements, but these benefits are the most common criteria across offerings from providers like BT, Virgin Media, Sky, and Vodafone. Applications often involve verifying your benefits status with the provider.

How to use our broadband comparison

The tools on this page allow you to select and filter by all of the criteria we've talked about thus far. If you're finding it confusing though, no problem. Here are some pointers:

• Step 1: Enter your postcode at the top of the page. Our checker will find exactly what's available where you live
• Step 2: The list presented will initially be sorted by 'Recommended' – that is, we've prioritised deals and providers which rate highest as a combination of what their customers say, how our in-house experts rate the providers (broadband reviews), and which deals are currently the most popular. The closer a deal is to the top of the page when it's sorted this way, the stronger our recommendation
• Step 3: You can and should re-sort the list using the dropdown menu above the top-listed package. If you have a budget or a speed in mind, this can be a useful way to see how all providers compare on a sliding scale
• Step 4: The filters (on the left of the list on a computer, or via the 'Filter' button on mobile) can be used to narrow down your search – to one or more providers, to a particular budget, to deals that comes with rewards or cashback (our favourite) and more. Feel free to play around with them. There's a reset button to start again if you get lost along the way
• Step 5: The 'Save Deal' button allows you to make a shortlist as you go and look at them side-by-side. And once you've narrowed things down to one or two deals, you can hit the 'more info' button to see more stats about the package or packages

Of course, not everyone comes into their search knowing what speed they need. Don't worry! We have a tool that'll help you find out. Just hit 'Get started' below: