Akamai: Global average Internet speed grew 27% year-over-year to 3.8 Mbps, mobile traffic jumped by 70%

Global average connection speeds have hit a new high, rising 27 percent year-over-year to 3.8 Mbps. At the same time, the demands of the mobile world continue to grow, with data traffic increasing by 70 percent in the last year. The latest figures come from Akamai, which today published its quarterly State of the Internet report for Q4 2013.

The firm listed 133 markets as experiencing an increase in average connection speeds year-over-year, ranging from 0.7 percent in Lebanon (to 1.3 Mbps) to a 164 percent rise in Réunion (to 6.4 Mbps). Only seven countries saw their average connection speeds decrease quarter-over-quarter, with losses of more than 20 percent in Lesotho, Syria, and the United Arab Emirates (to 1.4 Mbps, 1.4 Mbps, and 4.2 Mbps respectively.)

As you can see below, all of the top 10 countries/regions saw double-digit percentage growth year-over-year, but only six saw growth quarter-over-quarter:

“We’ve reached a significant milestone in the improvement of average connection speeds,” said David Belson, editor of the State of the Internet Report. “The fact that all of the top 10 countries/regions’ average connection speeds are now at or exceeding the high broadband threshold – and continued strong growth in countries like South Korea and Ireland – is indicative of the progress that’s being made in broadband penetration. It’s reasonable to expect these promising trends will continue to be reflected in future reports.”

Global broadband adoption, which Akamai rates as speeds of 4 Mbps and up, increased 4.3 percent last quarter to reach 55 percent penetration. Global high broadband, rated as 10 Mbps and up, stayed at 19 percent penetration after a nominal 1.6 percent increase over the previous quarter.

As in previous reports, Akamai also cited mobile traffic data collected by Ericsson, which has a presence in more than 180 countries and a customer base representing more than 1,000 networks, that indicated the volume of mobile data traffic jumped by 70 percent year-over-year, and grew 15 percent quarter-over-quarter:

Mobile voice traffic continues to show a flat progression, while mobile data is still growing steadily. In Q4 2013, average connection speeds on surveyed mobile network operators ranged from a low of 0.6 Mbps to a high of 8.9 Mbps. Only 22 operators demonstrated average connection speeds in the aforementioned broadband category.

You can check out the full 40-page report for yourself here:

Top Image Credit: craitza