PHL internet still among slowest in APAC despite speed increase

The Philippines' Internet speed has improved, but don't expect it to make waves—it's little more than a drop in the proverbial pond.

 

The Philippines’s Internet speed averaged 2.7 Mbps in the fourth quarter of 2014, peaking at 21.9 Mbps. This is according to cloud services provider Akamai’s latest state of the Internet report. According to the previous quarter’s report, Internet speeds in the Philippines averaged at 2.5 Mbps. This puts the country among the bottom five in terms of average Internet speed in the Asia Pacific (APAC) region, with a global ranking of 101.

Negative Y-O-Y change
 

However, the Philippines’ peak connection speed actually dropped 33% compared to the fourth quarter of 2013, making the country one of the only two that showed a negative year-on-year change.

 

Among APAC countries, South Korea had the highest average connection speed (22.2 Mbps) while Hong Kong had the highest peak connection speed (87.7 Mbps). Indonesia had the lowest average (1.9 Mbps) and peak (13.4 Mbps) connection speed.

 

Globally, the average connection speed increased by 20%, reaching 4.5 Mbps, with a peak of 26.9 Mbps.

 

Japan had the highest mobile connection speed (8.3 Mbps) while New Caledonia had the lowest (1.0 Mbps). The highest peak was in Singapore (157.3 Mbps) while the lowest was in Iran (7.7 Mbps).

 

PHL barely makes the cut

 

High broadband connectivity is defined as speeds higher than 10 Mbps, while broadband connectivity is speeds above 4 Mbps. Akamai defines “4k readiness” as speeds higher than 15 Mbps.

 

The Philippines barely passed the threshold for high broadband connectivity, with only 0.6% of connections reaching speeds above 10 Mbps. The state of the Internet report from the third quarter of 2013 showed that the Philippines didn’t even “qualify for inclusion in the global ranking” since the broadband adoption rate in the country was so low.

 

While the country still hasn’t reached a global ranking, this still represents a vast improvement (180%) from high broadband connectivity in the fourth quarter of 2013.

 

The Philippines ranked 93rd globally for broadband connectivity, with 9.8% connections reaching speeds above 4 Mbps. This places the country among the bottom three in the APAC region, though it shows an improvement of 173% from the fourth quarter of 2013.

 

Only 0.2% of connections in the Philippines are 4k-ready, improving 127% compared to the fourth quarter of 2013.

Comparison with neighboring countries
 

In general countries in the APAC region displayed strong growth for connectivity. Thailand had the highest yearly high broadband growth, improving 325%. Vietnam had the highest yearly broadband connectivity growth (590%) while Thailand had the highest yearly 4k readiness improvement (312%).

 

South Korea had the highest broadband adoption rate, with 95% of its connections having average speeds above 4 Mbps. It also had the highest 4k readiness, with 61% of connections reaching speeds of more than 15 Mbps.

 

China is an exception as the only country that declined in both high broadband (-37%) and broadband (-2.3%) connectivity. Its 4k readiness also declined, going down by 29% compared to the fourth quarter of 2013. — TJD, GMA News