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Does Cardiff have full fibre broadband?

Yes, Cardiff has a good range of full fibre options across the city. Openreach has extensive full fibre coverage all over the area, and there are a couple of smaller alternative providers that supply fibre-to-the-premises to a decent number of Cardiff properties.

Full fibre uses fibre optic cabling all the way to your home, as opposed to most standard fibre services, which still use copper for the last part of the journey. Full fibre results in speeds that can be up to 12 times faster than part-fibre connections, which most residents still use.

Openreach has the widest full fibre coverage because it's already the largest broadband network in the country. It's a lot easier for it to turn its existing part-fibre connections into full fibre ones compared to smaller providers that need to install brand new networks in each area.

However, this hasn't stopped smaller providers like Hyperoptic and YouFibre making some good ground in particular regions of the city. So depending on where you live, you may find that these networks are available to you as well.

Guide: all you need to know about full fibre

What's the fastest broadband in Cardiff?

Cardiff is very well covered by high-speed broadband services, including Virgin Media cable broadband and a number of full fibre networks.

The fastest widely available speeds are from Virgin Media, which offers packages of up to 1.1Gbps through its dedicated cable network—though this may not be available to everyone. The same goes for full fibre, which is available to most Cardiff residents and provides speeds around 1Gbps (1000Mbps).

The speeds available to your home heavily depends on if these networks are available on your street or not, so it pays to check what's available to your home. Our speed test tool can show you the speeds you can expect to receive at your home.

Which broadband providers are in Cardiff?

In addition to providers using Openreach's network, several other providers offer full fibre broadband in Cardiff. For example, city-focused firm Hyperoptic runs FTTP services to dozens of buildings in the city centre, most of which are large, modern apartment blocks.

Openreach providers

Many of the UK's most well-known broadband providers use the Openreach network, which is owned by BT Group. Providers that use it include BT, Sky, Plusnet, NOW Broadband, Vodafone, TalkTalk and many more.

Openreach supplies two different types of fibre broadband - part-fibre and full fibre. It's likely you can get both in Cardiff, but its full fibre network isn't as widely available just yet. So despite its wide coverage, if it's not available at your home yet, it may be up to a couple of years before you see it still.

Virgin Media

Virgin Media has very strong coverage of its own ultrafast broadband network in most built-up areas of Cardiff. In fact, it was the first well-established ultrafast provider to offer 100Mbps and above broadband speeds in the city.

The provider is also working on rolling out its own official full fibre network, called 'Nexfibre'. There is some availability of this connection type in northern Cardiff (Lisvane, Rhiwbina and Birchgrove, and then south west of Cardiff in Dinas Powys).

Are there any altnet broadband providers in Cardiff?

In addition to the nationwide broadband networks, there are a number of smaller, independent full fibre operators in Cardiff called 'altnets'. However, unlike some other major UK cities, Cardiff doesn't have any CityFibre availability. This is the UK's largest altnet with over three million properties nationwide.

This said, there is still a notable amount of alternative providers in the city:

Grain Connect: Good availability in the Roath area.
Hyperoptic: Good broadband overage in south Cardiff, such as the City Centre, Butetown, parts of Cardiff Bay and around the International Sports Village.
Michaelston-y-Fedw: Availability dotted around rural areas between Cardiff and Newport.
YouFibre (Netomnia): Availability in eastern Cardiff, in places like Pontprennau, Llanrumney, St Mellons and Trowbridge.

Guide: Altnet broadband providers explained

Our broadband expert says

“Cardiff has a nice range of full fibre options and excellent indoor 5G coverage, so getting an ultrafast broadband deal should be quite a simple process for many residents.

If you can't access these services though, not all is lost. Many households can do just fine with a part-fibre broadband connection up to 70Mbps.”

Max Beckett, Broadband Expert

Is there good 5G broadband in Cardiff?

Cardiff appears to have excellent 5G coverage. But in order to enjoy the full experience of 5G broadband, you'll need to make sure that you have a good indoor 5G connection, as your router will have to be placed inside your home.

Here is the 5G signal strength in Cardiff for each of the main UK mobile operators:

EE: Great indoor 5G coverage over most of the city, except for northern parts near Cathays and just outside the city in Leckwith.
Vodafone: also very strong indoor 5G coverage all over Cardiff. The only areas lacking signal strength are Pontcanna and most of Cathays.
Three: Its indoor 5G signal isn't as strong as EE or Vodafone's but Three still has great indoor signal in most of the city centre, as well as parts of Cathays Park, Newtown, Adamsdown, East Moors and Atlantic Wharf.
O2: O2 doesn't specify indoor 5G coverage on its connection map, but it boasts great 5G signal across most of the city except for in Cathays and around Ninian Park train station.

What is 5G home broadband?

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How to find broadband deals in Cardiff

The best deal for you will depend on a number of factors. As well as the price per month, you should consider the speed you can expect to receive and whether this will be enough for your expected usage, as well as the performance of the Wi-Fi router on offer from the provider and what extra features are included, such as parental controls and antivirus software.

With so many broadband providers in Cardiff, it can be tricky to know what the best deal for you is. However, you can use the Uswitch broadband postcode checker to easily find out exactly which providers and packages are available at your home.

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Written by Max Beckett, Broadband Expert

Updated on 9 January 2025

Broadband in Cardiff

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