The average U.S. broadband speed connection was 17.2 Mbps in the fourth quarter of 2016, according to the latest Akamai “State of the Internet” report, released today. That was an increase of 5.5% over the previous quarter and a 21% increase year over year.
Nearly 90% of U.S. broadband users (88%) connected at average speeds above 4 Mbps in the study period, while 63% connected at speeds above 10 Mbps and 42% connected at speeds above 15 Mbps.
Average U.S. Broadband Speed by State
As usual the highest average broadband speeds were primarily in the eastern part of the U.S. The District of Columbia had the highest average connection speed – 26.7 Mbps — in the fourth quarter of 2016. The seven states that followed it were all in the east and had average connection speeds of 19.9 Mbps or higher. The only non-eastern states in the top 10 were Utah and California, which had average connection speeds of 19.8 Mbps and 18.8 Mbps, respectively.
Delaware often comes in at the top based on various Akamai broadband metrics and the latest report was no exception. The state had the highest percentage of broadband users connecting at average speeds above 4 Mbps (98%), followed by Rhode Island (97%) and New Jersey (95%). All states in the top 10 were in the east, except Hawaii and Utah, where 94% and 92% of broadband users, respectively, connected at speeds above 4 Mbps.
The District of Columbia had the highest percentage of broadband users connecting at average speeds above 25 Mbps (34%), followed by Rhode Island (29%), Delaware (27%) and six other eastern states. The only state in the top 10 based on that metric was California, which was number 10 at 20%.
The average mobile broadband speed in the U.S. was 7.9 Mbps in the fourth quarter of 2016, according to Akamai.
In the new report, Akamai also looked at average web page load times for broadband and mobile service. The U.S. numbers for that metric were 2712 ms and 3757 ms.
