Average broadband speed breaks 4Mbps

The average speed of broadband in the UK has broken the 4Mbps mark.

The exact average works out as 4.137Mbps which is the first time the speed has gone above 4Mbps, according to Broadband.co.uk who this week released its speed test results for April.

A spokesperson from the website explained the test in a statement. They said: "We record tens of thousands of speed tests every month [but] unlike other speed test services we record the Internet Service Provider (ISP) by IP address making our ISP recording very accurate rather than relying on self selection."

Each month the site tests 11 ISPs including Orange, BT and Tiscali.

The fastest average download speed was provided by Virgin Media at 6.190Mbps. However in comparison to its announcement of piloting 200Mbps broadband yesterday it seems the UK's average is far behind what is actually achievable.

O2, which recently won many awards in a broadband provider survey, came in a close second having upped its average speed this month by 0.5Mbps. But it still lags just behind Virgin.

A new area that the website has tested this month is the ability for providers to achieve the maximum speed that is available to them. Here, Virgin Media came out on top again with 124 per cent achievement in its fibre optic connections, but all suppliers average out at 77 per cent in terms of achievement.