A recent report has looked at how broadband numbers have increased in the UK and what the future hold for broadband popularity

Over recent years the popularity of broadband has increased considerably throughout the UK, and this has resulted in more and more households and businesses benefiting from this technology. This has been aided by the ever-increasing choice of broadband provider coupled with some very good deals on broadband packages in terms of speed and cost, enabling more people to afford greater access to broadband services throughout the UK.

A recent report compiled by Point Topic has looked at what the future holds in terms of popularity of broadband services in the UK, and based on continuing growth the UK is set to have twenty one millions broadband customers by the end of 2012, which is, of course, just five years away. According to the report there will be two million business broadband connections and nineteen million residential ones by the end of 2012.

This is based on a far steadier growth pattern, which has been seen over the past two quarters, compared to the more rapid growth seen in pervious quarters. The third quarter of this year saw five hundred and fifty thousand new subscribers and the second quarter saw three hundred and thirty thousand new subscribers, which equated to around half the number of subscribers seen during the previous two quarters.

According to experts the main reason for the slowdown in broadband take-up is because so many people have already subscribed to broadband and therefore there are only a small number of households and businesses still using dial up. The figures on future broadband subscribers has been based on this steadier take up of broadband.

An official from Point Topic stated: ‘We forecast that about 4% of the remaining households without internet access will convert each year. That’s roughly the average for the past two years as a whole, but much better than in the last few quarters - so it implies improved performance by the industry.’