At the end of the 3rd quarter 2016, next generation networks which support high-speed fixed Internet represented 63.6% of fixed accesses to the Internet, more than doubling the number of ADSL accesses. In total, there were 3.3 million reported fixed broadband Internet accesses in Portugal.
Optical fibre, with 1.014 million accesses, became the second most popular form of fixed broadband access, with 30.5% of the total, behind cable network access, which still supports the most accesses (1.1 million accesses or 33.1% of the total). ADSL became the third most common form of fixed broadband access with 29% of accesses, while LTE at a fixed location represented 7.2% of total accesses.
The number of accesses based on optical fibre increased by 7% over the 3rd quarter and by as much as 31.1% versus the same quarter of 2015, as the technology that contributed most to the overall increase in the number of accesses. At the end of the quarter, there were 3.32 million fixed Internet accesses in total.
In terms of fixed access market share, MEO reported a share of 41.8% (shrinking by 3.2 percentage points from the same quarter of 2015), followed by Grupo NOS with a share of 37.2% (increasing by 1.2 percentage points) and Vodafone with 16.7% (increasing 2.7 percentage points). Grupo APAX (Cabovisão and ONI) had a 4.1% share of accesses.
In total, broadband Internet access traffic in Portugal increased by 10% in the 3rd quarter on the back of a 9% increase in fixed broadband traffic, which represents about 94.7% of total traffic. MEO had the highest share of fixed broadband traffic (42.5%), followed by NOS with 33.6% and Vodafone with 18%. Grupo APAX reported a 4.9% share of generated traffic.
It is estimated that at the end of September about 98.6% of fixed broadband Internet access service customers had acquired the service as part of a bundle of services.
In terms of mobile broadband, the number of actual users increased by 8.2% over the quarter and by 12.2% year-on-year, rising to 6.14 million users. In the case of mobile broadband, 41.3% of active customers belonged to MEO (falling 1.7 percentage points over the same quarter of 2015); followed by NOS with 30.8% (increasing 3.3 percentage points) and Vodafone with 27.4% (falling 1.8 percentage points). Cabovisão and Onitelecom launched commercial offers of the mobile broadband service in April 2016.
Internet access traffic through mobile accesses increased by 31.4% this quarter. NOS reports the highest share in mobile Internet traffic (36.4%), followed by Vodafone with 32.3% and MEO with 31.2%.
Consult the statistical report:
- Internet access service - 3rd quarter 2016 https://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=1402572
