New research from Broadband Genie has analysed 207,711 internet speed tests in order to identify the top slowest and fastest ten UK streets for broadband. The slowest street was found to be Greenfields Road in Bishop Auckland (average downloads of 0.35Mbps), while the fastest was Tynemouth Street in London (921.76Mbps). But this isn’t the full story.
According to Thinkbroadband’s latest data, some 85.5% of UK premises are currently within reach of a gigabit-capable fixed broadband network (1000Mbps+), which primary reflects the combination of full fibre (FTTP/B) and hybrid fibre coax (HFC) lines. Similarly, some 98.2% of premises should be within reach of a fixed “superfast broadband” (30Mbps+) network.
However, the new study, which seems to mirror similar reports from Uswitch, is based on consumer speedtests. One issue here is that such reports don’t accurately reflect the underlying availability of faster networks and are thus more a reflection of consumer take-up (i.e. people on slower networks/packages may weight against those on faster ones).
The report does acknowledge the aforementioned issue and highlights how 9 out of the 10 slowest streets should, in theory, still be able to upgrade to get speeds of at least 30Mbps. Suffice to say, consumer awareness and adoption of faster packages remains a key issue, although this will change over time.
In other cases, consumers may be aware that a faster service exists, but they have simply chosen not to upgrade due to various issues, such as the potentially higher price, lack of support for the new network by their existing ISP, fear of switching, being stuck in a long contract term or a simple lack of need or desire for anything faster.
Speedtest-based studies like this can also be influenced by other factors, such as poor home wiring, the user’s choice of package (e.g. 1Gbps could be available, but people may pick a slower tier), local (home) network congestion and slow WiFi etc.
In short, take these results with a pinch of salt and remember, the slowest streets are the ones that cannot get a viable broadband service and thus won’t appear in these studies. Similarly, the fastest streets are those covered by the handful of providers capable of offering them speeds in the 7-10Gbps range, such as B4RN, Youfibre and a few others.
Table: Slowest 10 streets for UK broadband
| Rank | Street | Broadband speed (Mbps) |
| 1 | Greenfields Road, Bishop Auckland | 0.35 |
| 2 | Collingdale Road, Northampton | 0.47 |
| 3 | Southcote Farm Lane, Reading | 0.61 |
| 4 | Water Lane, Oakham | 0.62 |
| 5 | Barrowgate Road, London | 0.67 |
| 6 | Birch Grove, Gillingham | 0.72 |
| 7 | Falmouth Close, Eastbourne | 0.73 |
| 8 | Grosvenor Street, Liverpool | 0.81 |
| 9 | Garden Lane, Royston | 0.86 |
| 10 | Turnberry Crescent, Aberdeen | 0.90 |
Table: Fastest 10 streets for UK broadband
| Rank | Street | Broadband speed (Mbps) |
| 1 | Tynemouth Street, London | 921.76 |
| 2 | Bloxworth Close, Wallington | 910.10 |
| 3 | Lumsdale Crescent, Matlock | 886.32 |
| 4 | Saxon Dale, Leicester | 823.98 |
| 5 | Moatview Park, Belfast | 794.34 |
| 6 | Limbury Road, Luton | 780.12 |
| 7 | Powerscourt Road, Portsmouth | 759.96 |
| 8 | Orrell Road, Wigan | 757.68 |
| 9 | Curzon Road, Rochdale | 757.54 |
| 10 | Tanfields Grove, Corby | 752.28 |
For streets to qualify for the study, postcodes needed to have the following criteria:
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A minimum of three speed tests from three unique IP addresses.
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Speed tests are from a commercial internet service provider.
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The test is from a fixed-line internet connection.
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At least 10 residential properties required at a postcode.
Postcodes were ranked from highest to lowest on a combination of broadband download speed and broadband upload speed, using an 80:20 ratio.