Which Country Has Europe's Best Internet?
The channel island of Jersey has been crowned as Europe’s broadband champion of 2023, with an average download speed of 265 megabits per second (Mbps). This is according to an annual study by cable.co.uk, based on the network connection speeds found in 220 countries and territories around the world. Jersey is officially a part of the British Islands as a ‘Crown Dependency’, but it is self-governing and not a part of the United Kingdom.
Liechtenstein, Iceland, Gibraltar and Andorra complete the top five in the European roundup, with average download speeds of between 190 and 250 megabits per second. These five places are also among the top ten locations in the world in 2023. At the lower end of the scale among the European countries and territories are Croatia and Albania, where the average download speed is less than 30 megabits per second.
The size of a service area has an impact on its internet speed. For instance, countries or territories like Luxembourg, Liechtenstein or Jersey have the advantage of having to provide service over a smaller area to that of larger countries such as Germany or Italy.
According to cable.co.uk, the overall average speed for the globe is speeding up. Where the world had an average download speed of just 7.41Mbps in 2017, it has risen to 46.79Mbps this year.