Total fixed broadband Internet traffic increased by 53% in the 3rd quarter compared to the same period of the previous year. The monthly average traffic reached 193 GB, 45.7% more than in the 3rd quarter of 2019. The monthly average traffic in this quarter was lower than the historic peak recorded in the previous quarter (209.7 GB).
The growth of traffic intensified from the 2nd quarter onwards, due to Covid-19. The pandemic caused a change of the patterns of use of the service, leading to an acceleration of the growth of Internet traffic. Considering the historical trend, it is estimated that the pandemic led to increases of 36% of the average traffic per access in the 2nd quarter of 2020 and 23% in the 3rd quarter of 2020.
At the end of the 3rd quarter of 2020, 83.9% of families had fixed broadband, corresponding to an increase of 4.1 percentage points in relation to the same quarter of the previous year.
There was an increase of 192 thousand fixed broadband accesses (+4.9%) in the last 12 months, which reached a total of 4.1 million. However, this growth was lower than that of the same quarter of the previous year (5.3%).
Optical fibre (FTTH) was the main form of fixed broadband access to the Internet, accounting for 53.8% of total accesses, 4.4 percentage points more than in the 3rd quarter of 2019. In the last 12 months, the number of fibre-based accesses increased by 275 thousand accesses (+14.2%). The accesses supported by cable television networks increased by 1.3%, and represented 29.3% of the total (one percentage point less than 12 months previously). ADSL accesses continued on a downward trend, having fallen by 21.5% compared to the same quarter of the previous year, accounting for 9.8% of total accesses (3.3 points less). Fixed accesses supported by mobile networks increased by 3.7% and accounted for 6.9% of total accesses.
In terms of shares of subscribers, MEO had a share of 40.4%, the NOS Group had 35.2% of the customers, Vodafone had a share of 20.4% and the Nowo/Onitelecom Group had 3.6%.
Considering only residential accesses, MEO had a share of 38.9%, followed by the NOS Group with 37.4%, Vodafone with 19.5% and the Nowo/Onitelecom Group with 4%.
In terms of fixed broadband traffic, at the end of September MEO had a share of 38.9%, followed by the NOS Group with 34.9%, Vodafone with 22.1% and the Nowo/Onitelecom Group with 3.3%.
Consult the statistical report:
- Internet access service at a fixed location - 3rd quarter of 2020 https://www.anacom.pt/render.jsp?contentId=1600607
