No, You Don’t Have to Pay for 100 Mbps (or More) Internet Service!

A while back we published a piece titled “Save Money on Your Internet Service – Avoid the ISP Up-Sell,” in which we discussed how Internet service providers entice (scare) customers into higher than necessary Internet plans with, not surprisingly, higher price-points.

Since that article was published, not much has changed with the tactics employed by Internet service providers, unfortunately.

What has changed, however, is the much greater broadband speeds that are being offered.

It was only a few years ago when broadband speeds of 30 megabits per second (Mbps) were considered top tier.

Since then, we’ve seen the download speeds of broadband plans increase significantly, hitting levels of 1,000 Mbps to 2,000 Mbps at some Internet service providers.

And with those increased levels comes the opportunity for these ISPs to upsell like never before.

Why would you settle for a measly 50 Mbps plan when you could have 100 Mbps or more? And that blazing fast 100 Mbps Internet service will cost just $10 – $20 more per month.

During the upsell, the customer service rep will oh so helpfully let you know how much faster you’ll be able to stream programming and how you’ll be able to use multiple devices at one time, all without that dastardly buffering that will surely disrupt your Internet time at the lower broadband speeds.

That sales pitch was bunk when we wrote the linked piece above and it remains bunk today.

It’s all an effort by Internet service providers to separate you from your hard-earned money for a product you most likely do not need.

Internet Speeds – The Truth

In a recent series of articles, The Wall Street Journal looked at Internet speeds, and what a typical U.S. household really needs when it comes to streaming, surfing, etc.

Unfortunately, the articles are behind the Journal‘s pay-firewall, so unless you’re a subscriber you won’t be able to read the findings for yourself. Just in case, here’s a link to “The Truth About Faster Internet: It’s Not Worth It,” by Shalini Ramachandran, Thomas Gryta, Kara Dapena and Patrick Thomas.

It’s a very well-researched, detailed article that provides facts to back up its claims.

Since many won’t be able to access the articles, I’ll provide some highlights below.

The findings were a result of The Wall Street Journal studying the Internet use of 53 of its journalists located throughout the U.S., using various Internet service providers. The study took place over a period of months, and was done in coordination with researchers at Princeton University and the University of Chicago.

One test involved looking at extreme bandwidth usage to see exactly how much capacity is actually used.

Here’s one example.

“To gauge how much bandwidth, or speed capacity, households need, it helps to look at an extreme scenario. Our users spent an evening streaming up to seven services simultaneously, including on-demand services like Netflix and live-TV services like Sling TV. We monitored the results.

Peter Loftus, one of our panelists, lives outside Philadelphia and is a Comcast customer with a speed package of 150 megabits a second.

Peter’s median usage over 35 viewing minutes was 6.9 Mbps, 5% of the capacity he pays for. For the portion when all seven of his streams were going at once, he averaged 8.1 Mbps.

At one point, for one second, Peter reached 65% of his capacity. Did his video launch faster or play more smoothly? Not really. The researchers said that to the extent there were differences in video quality such as picture resolution or the time it took to launch a show, they were marginal.

“For many people they are not going to see huge differences between 50 Mbps, 100 Mbps and a gigabit per second,” said Nick Feamster, a University of Chicago network-performance expert and part of the research team on the Journal project. Some 61% of U.S. households had speeds of 100 Mbps or higher as of December 2018, according to research firm Kagan.”

So, on average, when seven streams were going at once, only 8.1 Mbps were used. And there was limited to no video quality degradation.

Kind of blows those broadband upsell pitches out of the water, I’d say.

One of the examples that stands out to me in the article relates to a 15 Mbps tier subscription. The article states,

“Shalini Ramachandran, who subscribes to the 15 Mbps tier, used all her bandwidth for a significant portion of the seven-stream test but didn’t report any issues with quality.”

A lowly 15 Mbps tier plan was able to handle seven streams at once without any problems.

Which, is similar to my own experience paying for a 12 Mbps plan.

Granted, I’ve never had the need to stream more than 3 streams at one time, but we regularly stream Netflix while utilizing two devices to surf the Internet without any issues.

Online gaming is one area that some may think will increase bandwidth usage significantly, but the study didn’t really back that up.

“While the Journal’s testing focused on major streaming-video applications, the researchers’ software saw how much overall bandwidth households were using. Internet traffic from gaming and other sources like web cameras didn’t significantly increase bandwidth usage, the researchers said. Google’s cloud-gaming service Stadia recommends users have at least 10 Mbps, while Comcast says 3 Mbps to 6 Mbps is the minimum needed for most online gaming.”

So, again, even factoring in a buffer…excuse me, I couldn’t help it…broadband speeds of 100 Mbps and higher just aren’t necessary, even for those households who stream video, game online and plain old surf, all at the same time.

The article gets into other areas where speed may come into play, like, quicker video startup, HD quality and how much bandwidth, exactly, streaming utilizes.

Spoiler alert: None of them are affected in any meaningful way so as to justify paying for high bandwidth plans.

Limited Choice

Now that we’ve seen that high download speed plans aren’t really required by many households, the next step is to trim your monthly plan to a lower cost, lower speed alternative.

Unfortunately, for many, that’s easier said than done.

As the technology has advanced, so too has the lowest tier plans that Internet service providers even offer.

Depending on the Internet service providers available in your area, the lowest speed tier may be 50 Mbps. Or, in some rare cases, 100 Mbps.

Which could be fine as long as those 50 – 100 Mbps plans are priced reasonably.

But when ISPs price these 50 or 100 (or higher) Mbps plans as if they’re providing an Internet experience much better than can be achieved when using lower speeds, that’s a problem.

Luckily, thanks to competition, reasonably priced high-speed plans are more the norm.

And if competitors offer plans lower than 50 Mbps at much lower price points, the majority of households should give them serious consideration, and not fall for the “bigger, faster is better” false narrative that too many Internet service providers push.

Wrap Up

It’s just human nature to think if something provides more – in this instance, higher download speeds – then it must be better than lower-tier offerings, and, thus, worth the extra money.

While this is true for some things, it most definitely is not when you’re talking Internet service plans.

Most households’ Internet usage would fair perfectly well on plans offering less than 50 Mbps…significantly less in most cases.

If your Internet service provider offers plans lower than 50 Mbps at lower price points than you’re currently paying for the “better” higher speed plans, you should give them a look.

Your streaming and surfing likely won’t feel any different, but your pocketbook sure will thanks to the lower monthly broadband bills you’ll be paying.

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net