"Speeds and Feeds" for Home Broadband: It's the PC Story

Though definitions of “broadband” matter for regulators, advocates and suppliers, in most cases “broadband capability” matters quite little for most users of internet access services. Internet access matters quite a lot, in comparison. 

The analogy perhaps is what happened with personal computers. Suppliers used to compete on clock speed and other performance metrics. Then we got to a point where performance across a broad range was "good enough" that it stopped making as much sense to keep touting performance. 

We are getting to that point with home broadband services. 

Use of a Chromebook, for example, absolutely requires internet access. But whether use of a Chromebook requires “broadband,” defined as 100 Mbps downstream, 20 Mbps upstream” is highly questionable, if true at all. 

I’ve used a Chromebook on a symmetrical gigabit-per-second connection and on Wi-Fi connections of varying quality but with downstream speeds not exceeding 100 Mbps and upstream in the mid-single digits. 

Was the user experience on Wi-Fi as good as on my symmetrical gigabit connection? No. But was it a major issue? Also, no. Keep in mind, I do no gaming, do not upload or download large files routinely, have no other users on my connection and might watch 4K but never 8K video. 

Though we often use the terms interchangeably, “internet access” is not the same as “broadband.” 

Internet access is the ability to connect to the internet, regardless of the speed or platform used. 

"Broadband" is a moving target describing internet access at defined minimum speeds. The U.S. Federal Communications Commission defines “broadband” as 100 Mbps download and 20 Mbps upload. 

So, strictly speaking, many access services do not operate at “broadband” speeds, as the definition requires. That does not mean the access is deficient, simply that it might not meet the minimums. Wi-fi access on airplanes or in public locations are typical examples where internet access is available, but not at “broadband” speeds in both directions.

In fact, even cable modem services I have used can fail to meet the definition, even when offering gigabit-per-second downstream speeds, as upstream speeds did not hit 20 Mbps. 

For most of us, the issue is whether such failures matter. Often, they do not matter much, if at all. People can do all the things they want to on many connections that fail to meet the broadband definitions. `

As a practical matter, past a certain point, “broadband” matters relatively little in terms of user experience. 

Verizon Fixed Wireless Keeps Growing Subscriber Base: What That Suggests About Demand

Most of us "dumb end users" of home broadband have probably realized the value-price proposition for broadband outweighs the "raw bandwidth" claims we are urged by internet service suppliers to consider. The success of relatively bandwidth-constrained fixed wireless is a case in point.

In a market where headline speeds are pushing past 2 Gbps and up to 5 Gbps, it might be easy to dismiss claims that far-lower speeds are adequate for many households and use scenarios. In fact, for most end users, the number of users in a household, and the number of their devices, have more to do with suitability than the actual applications those people engage with on a routine basis.

Verizon, for example, reported fixed wireless net additions of 278,000 in the second quarter of 2025, growing the base to over 5.1 million fixed wireless access subscribers. Keep in mind that those connections tend not to operate faster than about 300 Mbps in most areas where Verizon has not activated its millimeter wave spectrum assets.

Though nobody outside of Verizon actually knows, it is possible that 30 percent to 50 percent of those fixed wireless connections operate at less than 100 Mbps delivered bandwidth. It is possible that 30 percent to 40 percent of accounts can use bandwidth up to about 300 Mbps.

And possibly 10 percent to 20 percent of customers have access to speeds faster than 300 Mbps.

The point is that a growing number of households find those speed ranges to be adequate for their needs and budgets.

The company says it is positioned to achieve the next milestone of eight million to nine million fixed wireless access subscribers by 2028.

Though definitions of “broadband” matter for regulators, advocates and suppliers, in most cases “broadband capability” matters quite little for most users of internet access services. Internet access matters quite a lot, in comparison. 

Use of a Chromebook, for example, absolutely requires internet access. But whether use of a Chromebook requires “broadband,” defined as 100 Mbps downstream, 20 Mbps upstream” is highly questionable, if true at all. 

I’ve used a Chromebook on a symmetrical gigabit-per-second connection and on Wi-Fi connections of varying quality but with downstream speeds not exceeding 100 Mbps and upstream in the mid-single digits. 

Was the user experience on Wi-Fi as good as on my symmetrical gigabit connection? No. But was it a major issue? Also, no. Keep in mind, I do no gaming, do not upload or download large files routinely, have no other users on my connection and might watch 4K but never 8K video. 

Though we often use the terms interchangeably, “internet access” is not the same as “broadband.” 

Internet access is the ability to connect to the internet, regardless of the speed or platform used. 

"Broadband" is a moving target describing internet access at defined minimum speeds. The U.S. Federal Communications Commission defines “broadband” as 100 Mbps download and 20 Mbps upload. 

So, strictly speaking, many access services do not operate at “broadband” speeds, as the definition requires. That does not mean the access is deficient, simply that it might not meet the minimums. Wi-fi access on airplanes or in public locations are typical examples where internet access is available, but not at “broadband” speeds in both directions.

In fact, even cable modem services I have used can fail to meet the definition, even when offering gigabit-per-second downstream speeds, as upstream speeds did not hit 20 Mbps. 

For most of us, the issue is whether such failures matter. Often, they do not matter much, if at all. People can do all the things they want to on many connections that fail to meet the broadband definitions. `

As a practical matter, past a certain point, “broadband” matters relatively little in terms of user experience.

Asking the Wrong Question about 5G

The claim  that "5G has failed” is in some ways an odd one. On one hand, critics tend to cite the unfulfilled promises of exciting new use cases. On the other hand, critics tend not to focus on the lower latency, faster speeds or energy efficiency that each successive network also is founded upon. 

But that might be the main point: each successive mobile generation has been successful and necessary precisely for the reasons that consumer home broadband experiences have been based on ever-increasing bandwidth, capacity and access speeds. 

So alter the question just a bit to understand the real impact. Do you ever really hear observers arguing that mobility services (mobile phone service) actually have failed? One does not hear such claims because mobile service clearly has been a raging global success. 

Some 71 percent of humans presently use a mobile phone, according to the GSMA.  

source: World Economic Forum 

So “mobility” has clearly succeeded, even if some feel particular mobile platforms have not. To be sure, proponents have touted the creation of platforms for futuristic use cases (the network will support them), not the extent of usage. Some examples can always be cited, though often not mass market adoption. 

To be sure,  every mobile generation since 3G has made such claims. And we might advance some very-practical reasons for the claims. Each mobile generation requires the allocation of additional spectrum from governments, which have to be convinced to do so.

Pointing out the new potential applications; the contribution to economic growth; educational advantages and so forth are part of the effort to secure the new spectrum. 

Also, infrastructure suppliers have a vested interest in enticing operators to create whole new networks precisely because it might be possible to create new revenue streams, or provide

Still, each successive mobile platform has promised, and delivered, latency improvements of about 10 times over the preceding generation, as well as potential bandwidth (internet access speeds) of 10 times more, and typically also energy consumption efficiencies as well. 

The practical improvements always vary from laboratory tests, though. The actual behavior of all radio waves in real-world environments is an issue. So are the realities of impediments to signal propagation (walls, trees, other obstacles) and signal interference.

Cell geometry also matters. Higher bandwidth is possible when smaller cells are used. 

Higher bandwidth is possible when channel sizes are increased (as when channels are bonded together to create a single wider channel from two or more narrower channels). 

And real-world “customer-experienced speeds” also are dependent on which actual frequencies are used widely by each mobile generation. Lower frequencies propagate better, but higher frequencies support higher speeds, all other things being equal. 

Still, the point is that observers never question the “success” of the mobile phone and mobile networks, only the “failure” of futuristic apps to emerge. 

That is not the point. The primary and essential value of each successive mobile platform comes from network performance (lower latency, higher bandwidth) and not the possible new apps, which cannot be created by mobile operators in any case, anymore than internet service providers having created Facebook. Google, Amazon, YouTube or Uber. 

Mobile operators can only create the physical infrastructure third parties can use to create new use cases. And that has been accomplished. But then innovation leading to new apps rests in the hands of entrepreneurs and investors.  

That’s the whole implication of “permissionless innovation” the internet is based upon: innovators do not have to own networks to build apps that use the networks. The entities that own the access or transport networks do not necessarily or primarily create and own the apps. 

Oddly, the reverse tends to be the case: highly-successful consumer app providers find they can vertically integrate into core network transport as a means of lowering their costs. That is why most of the world’s long distance networks (subsea, especially) are built and owned by a relative handful of big app providers such as Alphabet (Google) and Meta. 

It is fair to note that few of the futuristic apps touted for 3G, 4G or 5G networks have become mass market realities. On the other hand, lots of highly-useful apps not envisioned for any of those networks have emerged.

Net	Predicted "Futuristic" Use Cases	Unexpected "Everyday" App Developments
3G	Video conferencing, mobile TV, advanced multimedia	Mobile social media (early stages), basic GPS navigation, early app stores
4G	Immersive VR/AR, high-definition mobile gaming, remote surgery	Ride-sharing apps (Uber, Lyft), widespread video streaming (YouTube, Netflix), robust social media (Instagram, TikTok), advanced turn-by-turn navigation (Google Maps)
5G	Holographic communication, tactile internet, massive IoT deployments	Enhanced real-time location based services, very high definition mobile video streaming, cloud gaming, very reliable real time social media interactions. Increased use of live streaming services, and the further enhancement of cloud based applications.

All of which suggests we are very bad at predicting the future; innovations often emerge unexpectedly and only when users see the value. 

Consider only the industrial, commercial, medical and other applications generally centered around the use of sensors and mobile networks as the connectivity mechanism. Most have not taken off in a significant way, even if there are some instances of viable and routine deployment. 

Generation	Touted Possible New Applications
3G	- Telematics for automotive industry5
	- Smart home devices (thermostats, security cameras)1
	- Traffic light systems1
	- Vending machines with remote monitoring1
	- GPS trackers for livestock1
	- Wearable devices and e-readers1
	- Medical alert devices1
	- Remote weather stations1
4G	- Enhanced mobile broadband for video streaming and gaming6
	- Smart home applications2
	- Internet of Things (IoT) connectivity2
	- Remote monitoring systems2
	- Vehicle communications (real-time road information, navigation)2
	- VoIP calls and video conferencing6
	- Mobile payments6
5G	- Telesurgery and remote medical procedures4
	- Fully autonomous vehicles4
	- Advanced connected homes4
	- Portable Virtual Reality (VR) experiences4
	- Smart city infrastructure4
	- Ultra-reliable low latency communication (URLLC)3
	- Massive Machine Type Communication (mMTC)3
	- Industrial automation and robotics8
	- Remote patient monitoring in healthcare7
	- Large-scale IoT deployments in agriculture, utilities, and logistics

For the most part, the futuristic appl;ications have not developed as expected, and when they do take hold, it often is in the subsequent generation.

Many expected 3G to produce mass market usage of videoconferencing. That did happen, but only in the 4G era, with social media and other multimedia messaging apps, for example. That is a fairly common pattern: we overestimate routine adoption by at least a decade. 

Use Case Prediction	Actual Adoption (at least early stage)	Delayed Applications Likely Emerging in Later Generations
3G Expectations (Medical devices, telematics, mobile TV)1	4G Realizations (IoT connectivity, smart meters, vehicle telematics)2	4G Concepts for 5G Era - Advanced industrial automation3 - Mobile medical monitoring systems3 - Smart grid controls3 - HD public safety cameras3
4G Expectations (Massive IoT, Industry 4.0)2	5G Realizations (Network slicing, enhanced mobile broadband)4	5G Concepts for 6G Era - Holographic communications5 - Autonomous vehicle networks57 - Network-as-sensor technology5 - Microsecond-latency telesurgery7
5G Expectations (URLLC, mMTC)34	6G Projections - 1,000x faster latency than 5G7 - AI-optimized networks5 - Energy-efficient massive IoT6	6G Horizon - Real-time digital twins5 - Military-grade AR simulations5 - Advanced environmental sensing5 - 8K holographic streaming

The point is that mobile services and smartphone services have proven wildly successful. In fact, nobody doubts that. What often gets criticized are the many futuristic apps that could be developed with each next-generation mobile network.

That misses the point. As fixed network home broadband has to continually extend internet access speeds and bandwidth, so too do mobile networks. The bottom line is that each successive mobile generation succeeds to the extent it does so.