Survey: US fibre broadband deployments accelerate
December 23, 2022
Findings from the 2022 Fiber Provider Survey from trade body the Fiber Broadband Association suggest that more fibre was deployed in 2022 than ever before as the industry advances its goal to close the digital equity gap. The research, performed by RVA LLC Market Research & Consulting (RVA), shows that fibre providers passed 7.9 million additional homes in the US in 2022—the highest annual deployment ever, even with challenges in materials supply chain and labour availability.
According to the survey, there are now a total of 68 million fibre broadband passings in the US, up 13 per cent over the past 12 months and up 27 per cent over the past 24 months. Excluding homes with two or more fibre passings, 63 million unique homes have now been passed. Fibber has passed nearly half of primary homes and over 10 per cent of second homes. Fibre broadband buildout continues to expand in Canada as well, according to the report, with about 66 per cent of homes passed as 2022 comes to a close.
All this growth precedes the expected higher levels of annual fibre-to-the-home deployments anticipated for the next five years based on Federal funding programmes such as BEAD, RDOF, ReConnect, and other programmes focused on specific markets and demographics. RVA notes that although deployment expectations from individual companies are in constant flux based on many factors, many service providers have announced network builds exceeding the fibre footprint they have built to-date with private funding.
“High-quality broadband has become more important to consumers every year. fibre broadband exceeds all other types of delivery in every single measurement of broadband quality, including speeds, uptime, latency, jitter, and power consumption,” said Gary Bolton, President and CEO of the Fiber Broadband Association. “For the consumer this has real-world impacts, like more productivity, better access to health care and education, more entrepreneurism, and the option of more rural living. For society, this means more sustainability and, ultimately, digital equity.”