Sky has the lowest first-year cost.
£15/mo
for 12 months, then £37/mo
£19.50/mo
for 12 months, then £26/mo
£19/mo
rises to £21 in April 2027 (+£2)
£20/mo
rises to £23 in April 2027 (+£3)
£25/mo
for 12 months, then £29/mo
£15/mo
for 12 months, then £24/mo
£15/mo
for 12 months, then £40/mo
£20/mo
rises to £22 in April 2027 (+£2)
£15/mo
for 12 months, then £25.50/mo
£18/mo
for 12 months, then £34.50/mo
About fibre deals
Fibre broadband covers two different products under one label. Part-fibre (FTTC) runs fibre to a street cabinet and copper the rest of the way, averaging 35 to 67Mbps. Full fibre (FTTP) runs glass all the way to your home, from around 100Mbps to beyond a gigabit. The deal tile rarely tells you which one you are buying.
"Fibre" is the most slippery word in broadband. It gets stamped on lines that are glass all the way to your door and on lines that are mostly the same copper your grandparents had, with a bit of fibre bolted on at the cabinet end. Every deal above says fibre. Telling which kind is the most useful five minutes you will spend here.
The first is FTTC, fibre to the cabinet. Fibre reaches the green box on your street, then tired copper carries the last stretch to your house. Sold as plain "fibre" or "superfast", it advertises averages around 35 to 67Mbps, tops out near 80Mbps and fades the further you live from the cabinet. A few hundred metres of copper can quietly halve the headline figure without anyone breaching an advertising rule.
The second is FTTP, fibre to the premises, usually badged "full fibre". Glass runs the whole way in, no copper anywhere. It starts around 100Mbps, runs past a gigabit and does not care how far you live from the cabinet, because there is no cabinet in the chain. If that is the product you want, it pays to compare full fibre deals on their own terms, from which speed tier is worth paying for to which networks match upload to download. This page has a simpler job: making sure you know which of the two you are putting a contract on.
The advertised speed is the tell. An average of 35 to 67Mbps means part-copper FTTC, whatever the tile calls it. 100Mbps or more means full fibre, or Virgin Media's cable, a separate network that is quick downstream and much slower up. The words "full fibre" or "FTTP" in a deal name mean glass all the way. Plain "fibre" on its own promises nothing of the sort.
Connection type | What you really get | Verdict |
|---|---|---|
FTTC (part fibre) | 35 to 67Mbps advertised, less if you are far from the cabinet | Serviceable until full fibre reaches you, a dead end after that |
FTTP (full fibre) | Around 100Mbps to 1Gbps+, steady at peak times, strong uploads | The one to take wherever it is available |
Cable (Virgin Media) | Up to gigabit downloads, uploads a fraction of that | Properly quick, just not full fibre by the strict definition |
The differences between connection types all come down to one question: how far the glass gets before copper takes over.
The right tier is mostly about who lives in your house:
The trap is paying for the biggest number on the shelf. Working out what speed you actually need usually points at a cheaper tier than the adverts suggest.
If you are on FTTC now, two clocks are ticking. The first is financial. Out-of-contract FTTC prices drift up while entry full fibre gets cheaper, so plenty of households pay more for 67Mbps part-copper than their neighbours pay for twice the speed. If your contract ended a while ago, check whether you are overpaying before another billing month goes by.
The second clock is the network itself. The old copper phone system is being retired from 31 January 2027, and FTTC depends on that copper for its final stretch. Openreach's full fibre build has already put a gigabit-capable connection within reach of around 9 in 10 UK premises. FTTC has a retirement date, and signing a long contract on it when full fibre has reached your street is taking a long lease on a building scheduled for demolition.
Whichever way you go, judge a deal on the price after its scheduled rise, not the introductory figure. Under Ofcom's rules for contracts signed since January 2025, any increase must be spelled out in pounds and pence before you sign.
The default order is best value, which we treat as speed-per-pound, marked down for prices that leap mid-contract and for bundles padded out with extras you never asked for. Full fibre tends to rise above FTTC at similar prices, because it delivers more of what you pay for. Paid placements and exclusives are always badged, so you can tell a paid spot from an earned one.
There is no single best, because it depends on what your address can get. On Openreach lines most big names sell near-identical wholesale products, so price after the scheduled rise and customer service matter more than the logo. Where a smaller full-fibre network has built, it is often the value pick.
The best deal is the cheapest full-fibre line at the speed your household actually uses, judged on the post-rise price rather than the introductory one. For most homes that is a 100 to 150Mbps plan, not the biggest number advertised.
It changes constantly, which is why the live prices sit in the rail rather than in print. One rule holds: entry full fibre now often costs about the same as part-copper FTTC, so the cheapest broadband deals no longer mean the slowest ones.
For FTTC: speed fades with distance, the copper can fault in bad weather and the technology is heading for retirement. For full fibre: it usually needs an installation visit, it is not yet available everywhere and the cheapest deals tie you into a fresh 18 or 24 month contract.
It depends on which networks have built to your address. Openreach lines give the widest choice of providers, while smaller networks often throw in symmetric uploads as the sweetener. Weigh them side by side against the full fibre deals available at your address before assuming the biggest name wins.
Work out which fibre you are being sold, buy the tier your household will use and judge the price after the rise. Once full fibre reaches your street, the decision mostly makes itself.