Net broadband subscriptions to cable and wireline phone companies rose by about 890K in the second quarter of the year, according to the Leichtman Research Group (LRG). Last quarter’s broadband growth was short of the approximately 1.26 million gained during the year-ago quarter.
The two groups represent about 96% of the market, which now consists of 107.4 million subscribers. The cable companies have about 74.7 million subscribers and the phone companies have about 32.7 million, according to LRG.
The research firm says that about 8 million subscribers have been added during the past two years.
Other broadband growth results from the second quarter:
- Overall, broadband additions in the second quarter of 2021 were 71% of those of the year-ago quarter.
- The top cable companies added about 840,000 subscribers during the quarter, which was about 60% of the net additions for that group during the second quarter of 2020.
- The top wireline phone companies added about 50,000 total broadband subscribers in during the quarter. The group had a net loss of about 140,000 subscribers during the year-ago quarter.
- The telcos had about 400,000 net additions via fiber in the quarter and about 350,000 non-fiber net losses.
The top five cable companies and their results: Comcast (31,388,000 at the end of the second quarter of 2021; 354,000 net adds), Charter (29,634,000; 400,000), Cox (5,485,000; 50,000), Altice (4,401,300; 200) and Mediacom (1,468,000; 14,000).
The top five wireline phone companies and their results: AT&T (15,481,000 at the end of the second quarter of 2021; 46,000 net adds), Verizon (7,263,000; 70,000), CenturyLink/Lumen (4,666,000; 62,000 losses), Frontier (2,798,000; 22,000 losses) and Windstream (1,131,800; 9,500).
“Net broadband additions in the second quarter of 2021 were the most in any second quarter in the past decade, except for 2Q 2020,” Bruce Leichtman, president and principal analyst for Leichtman Research Group, said in a press release. “Top broadband providers added 8,000,000 subscribers over the past two years, including about 4,330,000 net adds over the past year, and about 3,670,000 net adds over the prior year.”
In June, the Pew Research Center found in a survey that 85% of respondents to a survey had smartphones and 77% have home broadband subscriptions. In 2019, 81% owned smartphones and 73% had home broadband subscriptions.
