Top Internet Services In Florida

Did you know that the state of Florida is the second with the highest number of islands in the United States, only behind Alaska?

In fact, there are over 4,500 islands that are ten acres or larger in the state. So many that Wikipedia was not able to list all of them so far.

Since it is a Peninsula between the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean, Florida has the singularity of having both sunrise and sunset on the see, because its coast faces both East and West.

Therefore it is no surprise its nickname is Sunshine State. Home to big cities such as Miami, Orlando or Jacksonville (the largest), the state is also the 5th best for broadband access in the United States.

It has a good 92,4% of terrestrial broadband coverage and an average download speed slightly faster than 160 Mbps.

The downside is that only 60% of its addresses have access to low price internet plans, the ones that cost less than $ 60 a month.

Also, only 40% of the state has fiber technology connections available and not even 65% of Floridians will be able to get an internet of 1 Gigabit or more.

There are 1 million people in the state that only have access to one provider that offers wired connections and over 250,000 people do not have access to wired connections at all.

Local government has received, since 2010, almost $ 9 million from the federal government to develop its broadband and data collection in the state. The Florida Department of Management Services is the one responsible for this job.

The government of Florida has also received over $ 55,000,000 in additional federal grants to invest in broadband infrastructure projects within the state.

But Florida actually has tried to become independent from the United States. It happened just months before the start of the Civil War.

The local Legislature approved an ordinance of secession, declaring that Florida was an “independent nation”.

The state then became one of the founding members of the Confederate States. During the war, the state was important for its capacity of providing salt and meat to feed the confederate armies and troopes.

As we all know, the Confederates have lost the battle, and Florida is now famous for its amazing beaches and hot weather.

Again only behind Alaska, Florida is the second state with the longest coastline in the United States, with over 1,350 miles, or 2,1 km of extension.

Actually, of the top cities in the state, four of them stand by the sea: Miami, Jacksonville, Tampa and Fort Lauderdale.

When it comes to internet providers, Xfinity is the one that offers the fastest average download speed, over 190 Mbps. Right behind, with almost 170 Mbps, comes AT&T, followed by Spectrum, with over 150 Mbps.

Let’s take a deeper look, or a deeper dive, on some of the top cities in the state and see what kind of internet we can find.

Miami Beach might be one of the most famous in the world, perhaps alongside the Brazilian Copacabana, in Rio de Janeiro .

But, actually, Miami Beach is a city by the side of the city of Miami.

Miami Beach, besides not having a single beach (as the name might mislead), has grown on the man-made barrier island that is between Miami and the ocean.

That is why the combo Miami plus Miami Beach has such amazing beaches: because these two mix the singularities of one of the largest cities in the United States with the characteristics of a resort city.

And with this big mix comes also a large number of Internet Services Providers (ISPs).

So lets make a fast stop right here and take a look at Hotwire, Communications, a provider that is not available in many places.

The company might be quite expensive and only 2,2% of Floridians have access to its services. But if you are the lucky one, you can have an extraordinary 10,000 Mbps plan.

Yes, you read it right, 10,000 megabits per second, or 10 gigabits per second. A fun fact is that, with a download speed as fast as this, it would take less than a second to download a full 1 GB of data.

In general terms, 10 Mbps is enough for anyone to stream movies on Netflix, but you might look for over 25 Mbps or faster if you have multiple connections at the same time. If you and those who live with you are heavy internet users, ok, look for 100 Mbps or faster.

But actually it is even hard to find something you would not be able to do with an internet as fast as 10,000 Mbps. Well, if you already have its services at your house or are considering getting it, maybe you can begin your own internet science lab.

The top two providers in the city are AT&T and Xfinity. In this case, besides AT&T having a slightly lower availability, maybe it tops its competitor because it has fiber technology.

We know that the download speed is a little slower compared to Xfinity, but fiber is newer, will be around for many, many years from now on, and also offers similar download and upload speeds, something that traditional cable connections do not.

In the city of Miami, 98% of its residents have access to at least two internet providers. And fiber is available for 45% of its addresses, a good rating.

Orlando is the one in the top-5 cities with faster internet in Florida that is not located by the coast.

It does not mean you have nothing to do in the city. Actually, it is home to some of the most famous theme parks in the world —actually, its nickname is “Theme Park Capital of the World”.

Have you ever heard of Walt Disney World? Yes, it is based in Orlando. Universal Orlando, home to Harry Potter attractions, for example, is also here.

70% of the most visited theme parks in the United States are located in Orlando. You also have Legoland, SeaWorld… Tired of theme parks, ok, the top 4 most visited water parks in the country are also hosted in the state.

Well, but let's be honest. If you are interested in some of these attractions, you will need to take hundreds of pictures when you visit it and, of course, upload them. So, it all comes, again, to the internet.

Although they are not available everywhere, Orlando has one of the largest number of different providers with fiber technology you will find in the United States: four.

Of course, the lead stays with AT&T, because it is available in 80,9% of the city.

But EarthLink, Centurylink and SmartCity come as good surprises, offering affordable plans for those who are lucky to have them available at their houses.

Meanwhile Xfinit is much less available in Orlando compared to Florida, AT&T has a new rival onn this state: Spectrum.

They both offer the same download speed overall, but if on one hand Spectrum is accessible in more places, on the other hand AT&T can offer customers its fiber connections.

Orlando has a bad rating of people only having one provider to choose from: over 5% of its consumers, or about 46,000 people.

The city, although, is the 6th best connected in the state, but only 39% of its addresses have the option to contract a fiber plan —which is especially surprising since it has 4 different providers offering this kind of connection.

Overall, Orlando has 30 different Internet Services Providers (ISPs), but only 13 of them offer residential service.