Time is Money: PCMag.com Names the Fastest ISPs in America
Vermont ranked fourth slowest
New York, NY (December 2, 2008)-In a world where time equals money, slow Internet connections have real-life business and quality-of-life implications. Fiber optic connections have proven themselves the fastest way online, but they're still rare-and expensive. Which Internet service providers (ISPs) offer the fastest broadband? And in which state? After conducting over 200,000 individual tests as part of its third annual study, PCMag.com found that Verizon's FiOS fiber-optic connections are indeed the fastest overall service, and Cablevision's Optimum Online proved itself the fastest cable ISP in the United States. Likewise, Nevada, Virginia, and Pennsylvania are home to the fastest surf speeds-the full state ranking is below. PCMag.com's "Best ISPs in America" list hits PCMag.com on December 2.
To uncover the nation's best ISPs, PCMag utilized the custom-designed SurfSpeed application (a utility that grabs pages from several popular Web sites to measure actual Internet surfing speed) and pored through data from over 17,000 profiles (that is, unique IP addresses).
Cable vs. DSL: DSL and cable lines were for a time synonymous in people's minds, but cable has clearly taken off in terms of sheer speed. Cable connections are 47 percent faster than DSLs. Cablevision's Optimum Online tops the list, with an average nationwide SurfSpeed of 839 Kbps. And 61 percent of users declared themselves satisfied with the service. Even the slowest cable service provider (Earthlink, averaging 565 Kbps) was faster than some DSL providers, from CenturyTel at 520 Kbps down to Alltell's measly 357. FrontierNet is the fastest DSL provider in the nation, averaging SufSpeeds of 724 Kbps. And, perhaps most importantly, just 27 percent of DSL users reported themselves satisfied.
State by State: Analyzing regions offers insight and challenges, but the region with the fastest Internet service-the West-is just 14 Kbps faster than the slowest, the South at 551 Kbps. The difference between states, on the other hand, is shocking, with No. 1 Nevada offering residents Internet more than twice as fast as bottom-ranked New Mexico.
The PCMag Fastest ISPs in America 2008 - State Ranking:
Ranking
State
SurfSpeed (Kbps)
1
Nevada
781
2
Virginia
765
3
Pennsylvania
747
4
New Jersey
727
5
Connecticut
716
6
New York
714
7
Nebraska
707
8
Oklahoma
695
9
Massachusetts
695
10
Maryland
691
11
Illinois
681
12
Georgia
679
13
California
666
14
Oregon
665
15
Delaware
646
16
Washington
625
17
New Hampshire
615
18
Minnesota
609
19
Texas
605
20
Ohio
600
21
North Dakota
593
22
Colorado
564
23
Florida
562
24
South Dakota
560
25
Alabama
556
26
Kentucky
547
27
Michigan
544
28
Missouri
539
29
North Carolina
534
30
Kansas
528
31
Indiana
524
32
Utah
517
33
Rhode Island
516
34
Arizona
505
35
Tennessee
474
36
Louisiana
470
37
Idaho
461
38
South Carolina
457
39
Montana
455
40
Maine
427
41
West Virginia
417
42
Mississippi
413
43
Alaska
402
44
Arkansas
402
45
Wisconsin
402
46
Iowa
398
47
Vermont
391
48
Wyoming
379
49
Hawaii
378
50
New Mexico
322
National avg
557
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