When considering what Broadband is for you you have three things you need to consider: Cost, Location and data usage. If you are in a data-hungry household, you need all the speed and reliability you can get on an unlimited package; if you don’t use the internet very much and you live alone then anything over 11Mbps is frankly overkill. Of course, a faster less limiting Broadband package will usually be more expensive, so there is that to be wary of.
But how do I know I’m ‘data-hungry’?
Consider how often you use the internet and what you use it for. If you are only using the internet regularly for emails and the occasional google search, you’ll probably only use about a gigabyte of data in an entire month and you don’t need fast broadband.
At the other end of the spectrum; do you play many always-online games? Stream videos, audio? What about downloads? As a gamer you may download patches, DLCs and mods on a regular basis. Movies also require a lot of data. In this case, about 40GB per month is a more likely average data usage and you’re looking at the need for an unlimited data package and high speed broadband. Live with several people with these sorts of requirements? That’s when you could define your household as truly data-hungry.
Rural vs Urban Broadband –
The main thing to keep in mind when considering location, or where you may be moving to, is that Rural locations tend to have much worse access to decent broadband than Urban areas. A lot of that is simply down to the fact that fibre optic and telephone infrastructure is either underdeveloped or completely non-existent in remote rural areas.
There is a solution to poor internet speeds or non-existent internet in rural areas: Satellite broadband. Although that type of broadband has its own problems and complications, it works practically anywhere and can provide good broadband speeds in areas where there are few or no other options for a usable internet connection.