Broadband speeds follow fiber deployments in Eastern Europe

Broadband connection speeds have been rising across Eastern Europe in recent years, with Hungary leading the pack with an average download speed above 100 Mbps in 2021, according to M-Lab data. Russia, Serbia and the Czech Republic were lagging with average speeds below 40 Mbps in 2021.

Regionwide, the share of average broadband speeds over 30 Mbps has climbed, driven by accelerating deployments of fiber-optic and high-capacity networks, often enabled by government incentives. In turn, increasing connection speeds are creating demand for over-the-top ultra-high-definition video services.

The rise of average connections speeds was mainly due to the fiber rollouts in the region. As fiber's share of fixed broadband households in Eastern Europe increased from 27% to 55% over the last eight years, the average connection speed followed, rising from 7.4 Mbps in 2013 to 48.4 Mbps in 2021.