European and World Broadband Subscriber Statistics

The Broadband Forum, who met in Brussels for the Broadband World Forum this week, has announced the results of their findings in regard to broadband’s spread across the globe.

And they have figures to show that the European market is the most utilised, with a third of all broadband users located in the continent.

This is the second year that Europe has topped the users list with 32% of worldwide broadband subscribers; that equates to 120 million users.

Statistics for the 12 months ending June 2008 show that top in terms of subscriber numbers are Germany.

The top ten European countries by broadband subscription are:

1. Germany 21,773,750, up over four million for the year;
2. UK, 16,718,400 up two and a quarter million;
3. France 16,655,786;
4. Italy 11,494,230;
5. Spain 8,566,835;
6. Netherlands up from 3,814,200 to 5,945,500 – on a per head of population basis this is probably the biggest jump;
7. Former communist state Russia at 5,649,800 would easily have the lowest saturation levels;
8. Poland 3,740,470;
9. Sweden showed little growth up from 2,478,000 to 2,854,200;
10. and not surprisingly tiny Belgium comes in last with 2,698,300.

Across the world 380 million surf the web with a broadband connection; that’s 17% more than a year ago.

The US has more subscribers than any other country at 77 million, but it looks like they will not hold that title next year, with 6.6% growth and 76 million eager Chinese logging on via broadband.

Europe has no less than five of the world’s most broadband subscribed nations including the UK.

The hit parade of broadband nations:

USA 76,878,195
China 76,005,350
Japan 29,434,700
Germany 21,773,750
UK 16,718,400
France 16,655,786
South Korea 15,331,549
Italy 11,494,230
Canada 9,005,181
Spain 8,566,835

21.5% more people now use cable to hook up than a year ago, and 25% more people use Telco fibre connections.

DSL now has a quarter of a billion users and is the most popular way to use broadband, owning 64% of subscribers.

WiMAX, WiFi and others are also playing a part, but are then often left behind when customers upgrade to higher speed DSL options.

Another big winner in the last year is ADSL2plus, up 62% possibly powered by its use in IPTV deployment.