Research has warned of a shakeout for the UK’s independent broadband provider (altnet) sector, with a number of headwinds facing players and consolidation an inevitability, but a study from the sector’s trade association asserts that altnets are now matching the established broadband brands for growth in new full-fibre connections, outperforming them on customer service and biting into their market share.
The State of the altnets report, published by Point Topic for the Independent Networks Cooperative Association (INCA), surveyed 2,000 adults in Great Britain, carried out by Whitestone Insight.
It shows that altnets’ network universe has expanded to around 19.7 million premises passed, with more than 3.5 million live connections. Altnets were calculated to have expanded their full-fibre footprints by 35% over the three-year period between 2023-25, seeing an average 18% take-up rate, an increase of 2% on the previous year. Yorkshire and Humberside has the largest altnet coverage, with at least 60% of premises able to access fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) connectivity from an altnet.
The report suggests that altnets’ year-on-year net additions are broadly tracking incumbent losses as consumers switch to newer, gigabit-capable infrastructure. It highlights how, between December 2024 and December 2025, UK broadband leader Openreach reported around 860,000 net line losses, compared with circa 850,000 net additions among altnets.
This, asserted INCA, was evidence of competition now biting where consumers have real choice, and that Virgin Media O2’s reported broadband losses of approximately 126,000 over the past year further reflected the intensified competition in markets characterised in part by altnets’ build strategies.
When looking at drivers for the growth of altnets customers, the report pinpoints value for money as a defining factor. It notes that while households face ongoing cost-of-living pressures, many altnets have led the market on price certainty, typically avoiding inflation-linked, mid-contract price rises that have driven bill increases elsewhere.
The data also shows that a greater percentage of those using independent networks feel they offer good value for money, compared with those from a national provider. Some 76% of altnet customers agree that “my broadband provider offers good value for money”, compared with 68% of major providers. A third of Altnet customers, compared with only 19% of major provider customers, say they “strongly agree” with this.
Another area in which the altnets say they are outcompeting the incumbents is on customer experience. The report states that independent providers consistently achieve “excellent” consumer ratings on review platforms such as Trustpilot, with the top-ranked ISPs dominated by altnets and the largest providers scoring far lower.
Despite the slower pace of network roll-out, altnets are found to have invested £2bn during 2025 and increased coverage by 20% year-on-year to reach 19.7 million premises by the end of the year, with nearly 4.4 million of these in Area 3 regions by UK communications regulator Ofcom.
These are primarily rural and smaller urban locations where material and sustainable competition to Openreach’s network is deemed unlikely. INCA said the survey findings represented a milestone in as much as the altnets have delivered full-fibre connectivity to nearly half of all premises in hard-to-reach areas.
The report also pinpoints “significant performances” by altnets Fibrus and CityFibre during 2025. Fibrus reported take-up rates of 28%, and CityFibre revealed it had exceeded 20% penetration across its consumer footprint, and that it was on track to exceed 30% by the end of 2026. Community Fibre also grew its customer base by 26% year-on-year to 429,000, achieving a take-up rate of just under 32%.
While INCA chief executive Paddy Paddison thought there was a “changing of the guard” emerging in the broadband marketplace, and that there were signs in the report of real promise for altnets, he said there was much work to do by the independent network sector, and still a lot to play for.
“Altnets are pretty much matching the big players for new connections growth, taking share from them, and there is a lot of evidence that the independent market is giving the big providers more than a run for their money when it comes to customer value and experience,” said Paddison.
“That is vindication for the government’s policies to create more competition in the ultrafast broadband market – and the UK is now benefitting from it,” he added. “We’re now seeing altnets moving from supplementing incumbent networks to increasingly being the primary source of full-fibre connectivity for millions of households.”
