Italy, Fixed Broadband Experience, November 2023

Opensignal has analyzed our users’ real-world data across Italy, nationally and also focusing on three cities – Rome, Milan and Naples. To reflect the varying way broadband is used, we have analyzed five different measures of the broadband user experience: Broadband Consistent Quality, Broadband Video Experience, Broadband Download Speed, Broadband Peak Download Speed and Broadband Upload Speed.

Key findings

National results:

• Vodafone excels for Broadband Consistent Quality experience in Italy among our users, securing first place with a score of 82.2% — around 3.6 points over the nearest competitors WindTre and Fastweb. Our Vodafone users also see the fastest Broadband Peak Download Speed with 440.2Mbps — 37.8Mbps (9.4%) faster than the nearest competitor WindTre.
• Fastweb users have the best Broadband Video Experience in Italy with 72.5 points on a 100-point scale. 
• Our WindTre users observe the fastest Broadband Download Speed in Italy — 59.9Mbps. Second-placed Fastweb is 1.2Mbps behind with 58.7Mbps. 

City results:

• In Rome, our users on Iliad see the fastest average download and upload speeds at 111.7Mbps and 86Mbps respectively, being substantially faster — by about 24.3% and around 90% respectively — than its closest competitors.
• In Milan, our Sky Wifi and Iliad users share the best experience in Broadband Download Speed and Broadband Upload Speed, with scores of 151.2-160.9Mbps for download and 115-120.2Mbps for upload. Users on Sky Wifi further share the leading experience in the city for Broadband Consistent Quality and Broadband Video Experience.
• In Naples, our users on Vodafone have the outright fastest Broadband Peak Download Speed with 627.7Mbps and also come top for Broadband Upload Speed with 67.3Mbps.

National broadband experience

While assessing the national broadband landscape across Italy, we focused on our users’ experiences with the nation's four largest internet service providers — TIM, Vodafone, Fastweb and WindTre. These four ISPs together account for 84.3% of the total 18.68 million broadband connections in the Italian market, according to the latest figures from the regulator AGCOM for June 2023.

Vodafone excels for Broadband Consistent Quality in Italy, securing first place with a score of 82.2%. This translates into a lead of around 3.6 points over WindTre and Fastweb, due to their statistically tied scores of 78.5-78.6%. The metric scores represent the percentage of our users' tests that are meeting the minimum recommended performance thresholds to watch HD video, complete group video conference calls and play games. 

Fastweb has the best Broadband Video Experience in Italy – the provider achieves a score of 72.5 points on a 100-point scale. Vodafone takes second place with 72.1 points. All four providers' scores place within the Very Good (68-78) category of user experience. This means our users are, on average, able to stream video at 1080p or better with satisfactory loading times and little stalling. 

WindTre is the winner for Broadband Download Speed across Italy, with our WindTre users experiencing average speeds of 59.9Mbps. Fastweb comes second, with an average speed of 58.7Mbps — just 1.2Mbps behind the winner.

Vodafone leads across Italy with the fastest Broadband Peak Download Speed — our users experience peak speeds of 440.2Mbps on its network. This is 37.8Mbps (9.4%) faster than second-placed WindTre with its peak speed of 402.3Mbps.

Our users on Vodafone and Fastweb have the best Broadband Upload Speed in Italy. The experience on the two providers is tied with statistically equivalent speeds of 28.8-29.3Mbps. WindTre comes in third place, with 22.5Mbps, which is around 6.5Mbps behind the winners.

Broadband experience across cities

Sky Wifi, Tiscali, and Iliad emerge as the winners of Broadband Consistent Quality in Rome, sharing the top spot with impressive statistically tied scores of 84.7-87.1%. This positions them around 3.7 points ahead of their closest competitors, TIM, WindTre and Vodafone, which share fourth place with statistically tied scores of 81.6-82.9%. Broadband Consistent Quality assesses the proportion of our users’ tests that are sufficient to fully enjoy activities like HD video streaming, video conferencing, and online gaming.

Sky Wifi and Tiscali also showed the best experience in Rome for Broadband Video Experience, claiming victory with statistically tied scores of 73.7-74.9 points on a 100-point scale. All seven providers' scores in Rome place within the Very Good (68-78) category of user experience. This means our users are, on average, able to stream video at 1080p or better with satisfactory loading times and little stalling. 

Iliad has the best experience in Rome for Broadband Download Speed. The provider takes the lead among the compared competition with average speeds of 111.7Mbps — giving Iliad a significant lead of around 21.8Mbps over its closest competitors TIM and Sky Wifi.

TIM, WindTre and Iliad excel at peak download speeds, with our users using their networks observing the fastest Broadband Peak Download Speed experience in Rome, with tied scores of 494.4-591Mbps. This places them around 82.6Mbps ahead of their competitors – Vodafone, Fastweb, Sky Wifi, and Tiscali — which tie for fourth place. 

Iliad emerges as the outright leader for Broadband Upload Speed, with average speeds of 86Mbps in Rome, as measured by our users. This means that our users on Iliad see upload speeds that are about  40.8Mbps (90%) faster than those seen on its rivals — TIM, Fastweb, and Sky Wifi, which tie for second place with speeds of 44.3-46.2Mbps. 

In Milan, our users with Sky Wifi and Tiscali observe the most consistent quality of network experience — the providers take first place with scores in 90.5-93% range for Broadband Consistent Quality. This impressive performance translates into a substantial lead of around 5.3 percentage points over the runner-ups Iliad and Vodafone, which tie for second place with statistically equivalent scores of 85.4-87.5%.

When it comes to Broadband Video Experience in Milan, Vodafone, Fastweb, Sky Wifi, Tiscali and Iliad also come top with statistically tied scores of 73.8-75.3 on a 100-point scale, the five providers have a lead of around 1.2 percentage points over their competition — TIM and WindTre which secure third place with statistically tied scores of 73.1-73.4 points. All providers' scores in Milan place within the Very Good (68-78) category of user experience. This means our users are, on average, able to stream video at 1080p or better with satisfactory loading times and little stalling. 

For Broadband Download Speed in Milan, our Sky Wifi and Iliad users have the best experience, with average speeds of 151.2-160.9Mbps. This translates into a significant lead of around 23.5Mbps over the runner-ups, Vodafone and Tiscali, given their scores in 126.5-138.5Mbps range.

TIM, Vodafone and Iliad jointly secure the top position in Milan for Broadband Peak Download Speed. With average peak speeds measured among our users of 565.2-741.2Mbps, they outpace their competitors — WindTre, Fastweb,Sky Wifi and Tiscali — by around128.3Mbps. These four providers lag behind with peak speeds ranging from 477.2-535.3Mbps.

For Broadband Upload Speed, the leaders in Milan are Sky Wifi and Iliad, with our users on their networks observing average upload speeds in the 115-120.2Mbps range. This performance surpasses the combined efforts of Vodafone, Fastweb and Tiscali, securing a lead of around 21.3Mbps over the runner-ups, whose scores are in the 93-99.4Mbps range.

In Naples, TIM and Vodafone share the top spot for Broadband Consistent Quality. With winning statistically tied scores of 84.5-84.7%, these providers command a lead of around 4.3 percentage points over the second-placed contenders, WindTre and Fastweb — with their statistically tied scores of 79.4-81.3%. The scores for Broadband Consistent Quality are the percentage of users’ tests that have met the minimum recommended performance thresholds to watch HD video, complete group video conference calls and play games. 

For Broadband Video Experience in Naples — TIM, WindTre and Vodafone lead with statistically tied scores of 73.1-73.9 points on a 100-point scale. All of the compared providers scores in Naples place within the Very Good (68-78) category of user experience. This means our users are, on average, able to stream video at 1080p or better with satisfactory loading times and little stalling. 

TIM, Vodafone and WindTre share the lead for Broadband Download Speed with average speeds, as seen by our users, of 95-103.8Mbps. This gives these three providers a substantial experience advantage of around 13.5Mbps over the fourth-place provider Fastweb with 85.7Mbps.

In terms of Broadband Peak Download Speed in Naples, the best experience is outright with Vodafone. With peak download speeds of 627.7Mbps, the provider’s score has a significant lead of around 121.3Mbps over TIM, WindTre and Fastweb, whose statistically tied speeds are in the 478.8-530Mbps range, securing them shared second place.

Vodafone stands out as the winner in Naples for Broadband Upload Speed, with a score of 67.3Mbps. Fastweb follows closely behind in second place with a score of 56.4Mbps. This means that our Vodafone users’ average upload speeds are 10.9 Mbps (19.3%) faster than those on Fastweb.

Methodology and definitions

Opensignal captures user measurements across all broadband network architectures, encompassing fiber (FTTx), xDSL, cable, fixed wireless access (FWA) via 4G and 5G, as well as satellite, and reports on a holistic evaluation of our users’ experience with the listed providers' internet services. We have only included the largest fixed broadband providers by market share in each area, determined by our user base size.

Tariff characteristics — for example, speed tiers or data caps — vary greatly by provider and the dispersion of the plan mix will affect the average experience result. Opensignal’s measurements capture users’ experience, regardless of the plan that they have purchased from their provider. This report analyzes the real-world situation across all users’ plans.

Broadband Consistent Quality 
Measures how often users’ experience on a network was sufficient to support common applications’ requirements. Broadband Consistent Quality uses six key performance indicators, including download and upload speed, latency, jitter, packet loss and time to first byte. Metrics are represented as a percentage of users’ tests that have met the minimum recommended performance thresholds to watch HD video, complete group video conference calls and play games. Broadband Consistent Quality quality is measured across all users in all hours of the day.

Broadband Video Experience 
Opensignal’s adaptive video experience quantifies the quality of video streamed to mobile devices by measuring real-world video streams over an operator's network. The metric measures users’ adaptive video experience using a Mean Opinion Score (MOS) approach inspired by International Telecommunication Union (ITU) studies which have derived a relationship between technical parameters of adaptive bitrate video streaming and the perceived video experience as reported by real people.

The videos tested are streamed directly from the world’s largest video content providers and include a wide selection of resolutions that dynamically match the network conditions, available bandwidth and device performance. Resolutions range from 144p to 2160p, which is also called 4K or UHD (Ultra High Definition). The model calculates a MOS score on a 0 to 100 scale by evaluating a number of parameters, including: the time to start playing the video, the quality of the video, the time playing each resolution, and the time spent re-buffering.

Broadband Download Speed 
Measured in Mbps, Broadband Download Speed represents the typical everyday speeds a user experiences across a provider’s network.

Broadband Peak Download Speed 
Measured in Mbps, Broadband Peak Download Speed represents the 98th percentile of the user speed distribution. i.e. this is what the users with the highest speeds within the footprint experience.

Broadband Upload Speed 
Measured in Mbps, Broadband Upload Speed measures the average upload speeds for each internet service provider observed by our users across their fixed networks. Typically, upload speeds are slower than download speeds, but this often depends on the technology used for broadband connections.