This is our regular update on fixed broadband availability in the UK, tracking the progress between the end of 2023 and 2024. We also analyse some Q4 2024 trends. The analysis is based on the Thinkpoint broadband availability dataset which includes 1.7m postcodes. More granular, postcode level broadband availability updates by ISP and technology, are available to ourThinkPoint customers.
Note: There will generally be a lag to the operator announcements for premises passed at the time since it takes us time to properly track and audit any new deployments, unless the operators tell us about them. Also, we report RFS (ready for service) premises, while some operators and ISPs include premises where customers can pre-order a broadband service.
Key headlines
At the end of 2024, the FTTP coverage was 72.9% of the UK total premises, compared to 60.9% at the end of 2023. The number of FTTP premises was up 23.2% y-o-y.
Nearly 9.1m premises had access to 2 or more FTTP networks, up from 5.7m at end-2023. 1.3m premises were covered by 3+ fibre networks, with this number more than doubling in 12 months.
In Q4 2024, 45 local authorities (LAs) saw 10% or higher quarterly growth in the number of their premises passed with FTTP, compared to 122 LAs a year ago.
Charnwood, Eastleigh, and Telford and Wrekin saw the highest quarterly growth in the number of their premises passed with FTTP (53.8%, 53.3% and 51.8% respectively.
Nationwide 1.9m premises could choose between two or more fibre altnets, compared to 1.1m at end-2023.
At the end of 2024, only 15% of premises did not have access to gigabit capable broadband, thus marking the achievement of the 85% gigabit coverage goal at the UK level.
Openreach and FTTP broadband availability in general
In Q4 2024, we recorded 941K additions to the full fibre premises passed by Openreach, up from 869K recorded in Q3 2024. Our total Openreach FTTP footprint stood at 16.1 million premises, up 6.2% quarter-on-quarter (Table 1). Openreach full fibre now covers 48.9% of all UK premises, up from 46% in Q3 2024.
The decline in the number of Openreach ADSL, FTTC and Gfast only premises continued – their number went down by 940K, only slightly lower than the FTTP additions. Once again, the largest decline (-805K premises) was in FTTC only coverage. Non-fibre platforms still covered 16.3 million premises in the UK, though this number has decreased by 5.4% quarter on quarter, and it was only slightly higher than that of FTTP premises. We expect the scales to tip in favour of full fibre in early 2025.
Table 1. Openreach footprint by technology, Q4 2024. Source: Point-Topic.

Year-on-year, Openreach FTTP premises increased by 4.1 million (+34.6%), showing an acceleration in the build. Between 2022 and 2023, their footprint grew by 3.3 million premises, and between 2021 and 2022 it went up by 2.9 million (Figure 1). If the trend continues, Openreach should achieve their ambition of 25 million FTTP premises passed by the end of 2026.

Figure 1. Evolution of Openreach FTTP footprint, 2021 - 2024. Source: Point-Topic.
In terms of the proportion of total LA (local authority) premises passed by Openreach FTTP, it has particularly extensive FTTP coverage in regions and locations outside London and the South East. Similarly to the past few quarters, among the top 20 LAs by this measure, nine are in Northern Ireland (Figure 2). Belfast remains the leading local authority in terms of the availability of Openreach fibre, with 96% of its premises passed. Cannock Chase is the new entrant to the top 20 ranking in Q4 2024, with 87% of premises in this LA passed by Openreach fibre (up from 78.9% in Q3 2024).

Figure 2. Top 20 LAs by the proportion of total premises passed by Openreach FTTP, Q4 2024. Source: Point Topic.
During Q4 2024, Openreach added most FTTP premises in Bradford (+16K). Wolverhampton and Kirklees saw +15.5K and +14K new Openreach fibre premises respectively. While the top ten LAs by new FTTP premises covered were located predominantly in the northern and central parts of the UK, we saw two London LAs (Barnet and Harrow) and one Southeast LA (Medway) in the top ten league (Table 2).
Table 2. Leading ten LAs by Openreach FTTP premises added in Q4 2024. Source: Point-Topic.

At the end of 2024, the overall FTTP coverage, including Openreach FTTP network, altnets, Virgin Media O2’s RFOG network and KCOM was just under 24 million premises (72.9% of the UK total, compared to 60.9% at the end of 2023). The number of FTTP premises was up 23.2% y-o-y, with the growth continuing thanks to Openreach and the altnets, especially the likes of nexfibre, CityFibre and Netomnia (including brsk) with their sizeable footprints.
Fibre network overbuild has intensified in 2024. At the end of the year, nearly 9.1 million premises had access to 2 or more FTTP networks (27.5% of all UK premises, up from 17.7% at end-2023). Just over 1.3 million premises were covered by 3+ fibre networks, with this number more than doubling in 12 months (Table 3).
Table 3. Year-on-year comparison of FTTP network overbuild (all FTTP networks). Source: Point Topic.

The continuing FTTP deployment by multiple operators also had an impact on our ‘list of shame’ which shows the bottom ten UK local authorities (LAs) by FTTP coverage. Once again, the list in Q4 2024 features higher percentages – 6.1% to 29.8%, compared to 6% to 26.7% in the previous quarter, as FTTP networks cover more premises across the country. In Q4 2024, Eastleigh added 9K FTTP premises and got pushed out of the bottom ten by Warwick, which added only 1K (Figure 3).

Figure 3. Bottom local authorities by percentage of premises covered with FTTP (any network), Q4 2024. Source: Point Topic.
Eight out of the top ten best covered FTTP areas are Northern Ireland LAs, largely as a result of Openreach’s prominent FTTP presence in the country as well as the likes of Fibrus and nexfibre. UK-wide, the top ‘fibre rich’ local authority remains Kingston upon Hull (99.3% FTTP coverage), largely due to fibre rollout by KCOM and MS3. Coventry also made the top ten, with 94.7% of its premises covered by FTTP. (The build in the top ten LAs is more or less complete, and as we see little change in this ranking we do not feature it any more).
It should be noted that these figures do not include Virgin Media O2’s Docsis 3.1 network coverage, which is widely available in some of the LAs. For the combined coverage data see our granular dataset.
Among the LAs, the largest number of FTTP premises added was in Birmingham (+26K), Stoke-on-Trent (+23K), and Southampton (+21K) (Figure 4). The top ten ranking is quite diverse in terms of regions, though northern and central areas of the UK still dominate. Six out of ten LAs in this league table are new entrants, compared to Q3 2024. Only Birmingham, Stoke-on-Trent, Wigan and Sandwell retained their top positions by FTTP premises added. Quarter-on-quarter, St Helens saw a significant increase, jumping from 69.4% to 80.6% of premises passed with full fibre. In Southampton the change was even more notable - from 66.1% to 83.9%.

Figure 4. Top ten LAs by FTTP premises added in Q4 2024. Source: Point Topic.
As some operators are slowing down their footprint expansion and focusing on encouraging service take-up, in Q4 2024 only 45 local authorities saw 10% or higher quarterly growth in the number of their premises passed with FTTP. A year ago, 122 LAs saw this extent of growth. Overall, even though the magnitude of growth in Q4 2024 is quite a bit smaller than 12 months ago, not least due to the emerging overbuild, the relatively high growth areas are distributed more evenly across the UK (Figure 5).
In Q4 2024, Charnwood, Eastleigh, and Telford and Wrekin saw the highest growth in the number of their premises passed with FTTP (53.8%, 53.3% and 51.8% respectively).

Figure 5. Growth in the number of FTTP premises per Local Authority (year-on-year comparison). Source: Point Topic.
At the end of Q4 2024, FTTP coverage was lower than 20% of premises in 7 local authorities, down from 8 three months earlier. The FTTP coverage was 50% or higher in 89.5% of local authorities, up from 83.7% of LAs three months earlier.
VMO2 and Nexfibre
In addition to Openreach and altnets, Virgin Media O2 (VMO2) is carrying full fibre network rollout, mainly via their nexfibre venture. In early 2025, nexfibre announced that it had passed 2 million premises with FTTP, having added 1 million premises in a year. It is a significant step towards its aim to cover 5 million homes by end-2026[1].
At end-2024, VMO2’s own RFOG/FTTP premises stood at 1.7m, up 12.1% year-on-year.
Fibre Altnets
As an increasing number of altnets are exceeding 100K fibre premises passed, we are now focusing on this lower limit. At the end of Q4 2024, CityFibre was at the top of the league with 3.75m FTTP premises covered by their network (Ready for Service premises). Vodafone, TalkTalk and Zen remained the largest retail providers using CityFibre’s network, with well over 3m each. This could change, once Sky start selling FTTP over CityFibre’s network, following the recent announcement of their partnership.
We already mentioned nexfibre, who confirmed 2 million premises passed at end-2024. Looking at other major footprints, Community Fibre passed 1.4m premises, Netomnia 1.3m, Hyperoptic 1.1m, and brsk 0.7m. Netomnia is nearing integration with brsk, following their recent merger, hence we feature their combined footprint in the chart (Figure 6). Their ambition to increase this to 3m by the end of 2025 will create a strong challenger to nexfibre.

Figure 6. FTTP premises passed by altnets, Q4 2024 (more than 100K premises). Source: Point Topic.
In Q4 2024, we recorded the largest quarterly increase in FTTP premises passed for toob (+68.7%). The operator’s network was also among the fastest growing year-on-year (+162.7%) (in the category of altnets with 100K+ premises passed).
Overbuild by FTTP altnets has increased further, as multiple network operators are increasingly competing for the same customers. This will put further pressure on take-up rates, profit margins and lead to further consolidation in the market.
At the end of 2024, 93 local authorities had three overlapping fibre altnets, up from 55 twelve months ago. South Holland in East Midlands and Staffordshire Moorlands in West Midlands were top of the league by new premises served by three altnets, with +5K and +4K respectively (Table 4). Five out of the top ten LAs in this category were in East Midlands, West Midlands, and the East of England, suggesting the overbuild is becoming more common in central and eastern parts of the UK. However, among all the 93 LAs with three fibre altnets present, more than one third (36) were still in London or the South East.
Table 4. Top local authorities by the number of new premises covered by three fibre altnets overlapping, Q4 2024. Source: Point Topic.

In Q4 2024, two fibre altnets overlapped in 291 local authorities, up from 225 in Q4 2023.
Nationwide 1.9m premises could choose between two or more fibre altnets, compared to 1.1m at end-2023. Just over 150K premises were served by 3+ alternative fibre networks, up from 76K a year earlier (Table 5).
Table 5. Altnet overbuild evolution (2023 – 2024). Source: Point Topic.

We should see overbuild slowing down in the future as consolidation in the FTTP market continues. In January 2025, Zzoomm and Full Fibre announced that they had agreed to merge their networks which overlap only by 2K premises.
Gigabit Coverage
At the end of 2024, 15.4% of UK premises did not have access to gigabit capable broadband (either a Docsis3.1 network or an FTTP network), down from 21.7% at the end of 2023. So, the Project Gigabit target of 85% gigabit coverage in the UK by 2025 has been achieved. Looking at individual nations, however, Scotland and Wales still have a way to go, with 21.7% and 23.3% of their premises respectively lacking gigabit access (Figure 7). The latter will benefit from the latest Project Gigabit fund allocation announcement with the contracts worth £289m.
In addition, these two nations saw the largest improvement in this area y-o-y: between 2023 and 2024, the proportion of premises with no gigabit coverage went down from 33.4% to 23.3% in Wales and from 28.7% to 21.7% in Scotland. England saw a 6.1% improvement (from 20.8% to 14.7%). In Northern Ireland, where only 3.5% of premises did not have gigabit coverage at end-2024, this measure improved by 1.9% during the year.

Figure 7. Percentage of premises not covered by a gigabit network. Source: Point Topic.
Local authorities in remote and rural areas still lack access to gigabit broadband, with Na h-Eileanan Siar topping the list by the percentage of premises not passed by gigabit capable networks (93.6%). City of London is also in the top ten LAs in terms of gigabit access with 61% of premises lacking it as of end-2024.
This quarter we recorded the largest improvement in Rossendale, where the number of premises without gigabit access dropped by 61% (5K), compared to Q3 2024 (Table 6). In the top ten ranking by this measure, seven LAs were in East Midlands or East of England.
Table 6. Ten local authorities with the largest percentage drop in premises with no gigabit coverage, Q4 2024. Source: Point Topic.

The complete dataset used to produce this analysis is part of our ThinkPoint service which involves UK Broadband Mapping at postcode level. For more information check our UK Mapping page.
To find out more you can contact us on 020 3301 3303 or e-mail oliver.johnson@point- topic.com
[1] Our mapped premises for nexfibre stand at 1.4m – see our earlier note about the lag in some of our data to operator announcements.
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