Broadband coverage reached 94% of the population in 2019 and the gap with rural areas was reduced by increasing its coverage by 32 points

May 4, 2020.- The Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation, through the Secretary of State for Telecommunications and Digital Infrastructures, has published the report "Broadband coverage in Spain in 2019", which notes an increase of nine percentage points in the coverage of broadband networks of ≥30 Mbps compared to the previous year, reaching already 94% of the Spanish population.

The increase has occurred in all the autonomous communities, although it has been especially notable in the provinces that had less population coverage of these networks in 2018, such as Zamora, Lugo, Ávila, or Segovia, which experience increases of 30 percentage points or more, thus homogenizing broadband coverage throughout the territory.

The Minister of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation and Third Vice-President of the Government, Nadia Calviño“The Government is taking all possible measures to promote connectivity infrastructures, which are essential for connecting rural areas, structuring the country and social inclusion,” he said.

On the other hand, ultra-fast broadband networks (≥ 100 Mbps) reached 83.6% of the population in 2019, three percentage points more than the previous year.

As for fixed access networks, the fastest growing technology platform is Fiber Optic to Home (FTTH), which allows data transmission services to be provided at speeds of 100 Mbps to all users and punctually at more than 1Gbps. In June 2019, fiber optics reached 80.4% of the Spanish population, an increase of three percentage points and half a million more households compared to 2018.

Rural areas

The report also points to the narrowing of the digital divide in rural areas, where the speed coverage of more than 30 Mbps has improved by 32 percentage points. In June 2019 the coverage reached 86.6% of the population, approximately more than seven million people living in municipalities whose population density is less than 100 inhabitants/km2, almost three million more than in 2018.

The increase in coverage of rural areas at speeds of more than 30 Mbps has been due to the impetus given by the Government at the end of 2018 for operators to comply with the obligations undertaken to guarantee coverage of 30 Mbps or greater at least 90% of citizens living in population units of less than 5,000 inhabitants.

Regarding the coverage of ultra-fast networks of more than 100 Mbps, the increase in rural areas has been twelve percentage points, from 38% to 49.8%.

Next Generation Broadband Extension Plan

Furthermore, the report includes the coverage forecast by adding to the one existing in June 2019 that will be reached once the projects currently under implementation in the framework of the New Generation Broadband Extension Plan (PEBA-NGA Plan), co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), are completed.

When these projects are implemented in 2021, the ultra-fast speed coverage will reach 91.24% of the Spanish population and 75.29% in rural areas, which means halving the difference in coverage between rural areas and the rest of the territory.

In order to continue rapidly with the expansion of broadband, a basic order for the period 2020-2022 was published on April 14 that will allow to complete the availability of broadband in the territory.

The report has been made based on the data collected from the operators of broadband networks, referred to on June 30, 2019, in relation to each of the 61,778 unique population entities existing in Spain, the demographic and census data of the INE of 2018, and applying the methodology of harmonization and aggregation developed by the Secretary of State for Telecommunications and Digital Infrastructures.