Netflix has released an ISP Speed Index outlining what providers offer the best connections to its services and where. The popular video-streaming company compared 17 broadband network carriers in the US and ranked them according to their average speeds when streaming Netflix videos.
The results themselves are somewhat unsurprising, with Google Fibre being the clear winner with an average of 3.35Mbps. Next were CableVision – Optimum with 2.35Mbps and Suddenlink with 2.19Mbps.
Verizon came fifth at 2.1Mbps, Comcast 7th with 2.06 Mbps, Time Warner Cable 8th with 2.04Mbps, AT&T – U-Verse 11th with 1.91 Mbps, AT&T – DSL 15th 15th with 1.43Mbps, Verizon DSL was 16th with 1.37Mbps and Clearwire came last at just 1.25Mbps.
Interestingly, ranks four through ten vary by just 0.1Mbps. In fact, most of the top rankings are fairly close together, discounting the obvious outliers at the top and bottom.
What we do find surprising is that Netflix would have the gall to do this at all. This is a move that will certainly not be popular amongst the major broadband networks, especially with Comcast and Time Warner taking a clear backseat to Google Fiber, not to mention that they were also beaten by five other providers.
The overall analytics service is pretty detailed, providing not only a monthly updated list but adjustable graphs whose dates can be set by the user.
The USA wasn’t the only country to receive judgement. In the UK Virgin won with 2.37Mbps, smashing the 6th ranked last-place holder EverythingEverywhere with its meagre 1.77Mbps.
Other countries include Ireland, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Norway and Mexico.
We think that this is a great idea. Not only does it show users how much real-world speed they’re getting for their buck, but it simultaneously puts pressure on the providers while relieving it from Netflix.
Many providers actually throttle speeds when connecting to streaming services like Netflix or Youtube and the blame often falls to the streaming service, rather than on the provider. This new analytics shows customers with fast broadband but poor Netflix streaming that yes, Netflix does provide good speeds to many of its customers and that maybe the problem is not on its end.
This point is hammered home by the default page in which only the fastest, slowest and average connection of each country is displayed, highlighting the huge difference in connection speeds amongst the carriers which it included in its comparison.
Source: Netflix
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