The number of broadband users in Europe continues to rise, with the latest figures from the European Commission recording a rise of nearly 3% in the last year.
There were 119 million broadband subscriptions across the 27 nations that make up the EU in July 2009, compared to 113 million at the same time last year. This means that 23.9% of the population of the EU now have a high-speed broadband subscription, up from 21.6% last year.
Of all the types of broadband lines, DSL remains the most popular by a long way, with 94 million users. Despite a huge increase in fibre lines, these still only make up 2% of the total number of connections.
The figures also showed that Europe is seeing an increase in connection speeds, with 80% of broadband users now getting speeds of 2Mbps, a 5% rise from last year.
The one in four that has access to broadband is good news, but it is still a long way from the EU’s goal of one in three households having high-speed internet by 2010.
Of all the EU countries, the ones to get the highest rates of broadband connections were the Netherlands and Denmark, with both having a connection rate of 40%. As well as being the highest rate in Europe, this is also the highest rate in the world.
Viviane Reding, the EU telecoms commissioner, said that broadband is “a pre-condition for a strong digital economy in Europe and for European leadership in new technologies and applications”, adding that “Europe is clearly ready to make the next decade thoroughly digital”.
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