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The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has released its 32nd Measuring Broadband Australia report, finding that most households on NBN fixed-line connections are receiving download speeds close to what they are paying for – but that a growing number of services on high-speed plans and fibre to the node (FTTN) connections continue to fall short.
The report, based on data collected throughout December 2025 by independent testing firm SamKnows (now part of Cisco), found that average download speeds across NBN fixed-line services reached 98.5 per cent of plan speeds during the busy evening hours of 7pm to 11pm on weekdays.
That figure is slightly lower than the previous quarter’s report, which recorded 100 per cent of plan speed during the same busy hours window.
ACCC Commissioner, Ian Oppermann, acknowledged the dip while noting the broader trend remained positive.
“While slightly lower than previous reports, it’s still encouraging to see Australians on NBN fixed-line connections typically receive the speeds they have paid for,” Mr Oppermann remarked.
New 500 Mbps Plan Now The Most Popular
The report comes in the wake of NBN Co’s September 2025 decision to increase maximum wholesale plan speeds on selected plans for fibre to the premises (FTTP) and hybrid fibre-coaxial (HFC) connections.
That change included lifting the plan speed on the NBN Home Fast plan from 100/20 Mbps to 500/50 Mbps. The upgraded plan is now the most popular among the 1,148 services monitored in the report’s testing panel.
Services on the Home Fast plan recorded an average download speed of 493.7 Mbps during busy hours – close to 100 per cent of the plan speed. However, 6.3 per cent of services on this plan were classified as underperforming, failing to reliably achieve speeds close to 500 Mbps or in many cases even exceed the previous plan speed of 100 Mbps.
The ACCC noted that underperformance on high-speed plans can often be caused by in-home equipment and setup issues rather than the NBN network itself. Consumers may be using an older home router that cannot support download speeds above 100 Mbps after migrating to the new 500/50 Mbps plan.
“We encourage consumers to contact their retailer if their broadband speeds do not reach the maximum speeds of their selected plan, so any issues can be promptly diagnosed and resolved,” Mr Oppermann noted.
“High-speed plans can deliver big benefits for households with high internet usage, but many consumers may receive better value from cheaper, lower-speed plans depending on their needs.”
FTTN Connections Continue To Lag
Fibre to the node connections continued to record the weakest performance among NBN access technologies. The report found 11.8 per cent of FTTN services were underperforming during the December 2025 measurement period.
NBN Co classified almost all underperforming FTTN services as impaired, meaning the maximum attainable download speed for those connections was measured by NBN Co as lower than the plan speed purchased by the consumer. This is typically caused by the length or condition of the copper line running between the street node and the premises.
“Retailers need to inform customers if their FTTN connection cannot achieve their selected plan speed so the customer can consider if they would be better off on another plan,” Mr Oppermann urged.
The fastest plan download speed available to purchase on FTTN and fibre to the curb (FTTC) connections remains 100 Mbps, and these technologies cannot access the upgraded 500/50 Mbps NBN Home Fast plan.
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Mr Oppermann encouraged affected consumers to explore their options.
“Consumers on FTTN or FTTC who are seeking faster speeds should speak to their preferred internet provider to check whether their connection is eligible for an upgrade to fibre to the premises,” he recommended.
Within the NBN50 plan tier, FTTN services recorded average download speeds around 10 per cent of plan speed lower than other technologies – a gap that has been consistent across previous reports. The NBN100 FTTN panel also recorded the lowest average speeds as a percentage of plan speed compared to other plan speeds and technologies, managing just 87.3 per cent during busy hours.
Underperforming Services On The Rise
Across all NBN technologies, 6.4 per cent of the 1,148 services tested for this report were classified as underperforming, up from 4.4 per cent in the previous report.
The increase is not solely attributable to FTTN. The report noted a growing incidence of underperforming services on FTTP and HFC connections following NBN Co’s introduction of higher speed plans for these technologies in September 2025.
Among FTTP connections, 4.9 per cent were underperforming, while 6.1 per cent of HFC connections fell into the same category. By contrast, none of the 41 FTTC connections in the panel were underperforming.
When underperforming services were excluded from the data, the average download performance during all hours rose to 103.3 per cent of plan speed, compared with 99.2 per cent when all services were included. The ACCC estimated that had underperforming services been remediated before measurements were collected, overall download performance would have been 4.1 percentage points higher.
RSP Performance Varies
The report tested services across nine retail service providers (RSPs) with sufficient sample sizes for reporting: Aussie Broadband, Dodo and iPrimus, Exetel, iiNet, Leaptel, Optus, Superloop, Telstra and TPG.
During busy hours, download performance as a percentage of plan speed ranged from 94.2 per cent (Aussie Broadband) to 102.3 per cent (Optus) across all NBN fixed-line plans. Telstra recorded 96.8 per cent during the same period.
All RSPs achieved busiest hour speeds above 92 per cent of plan speed, though some were more affected by high demand peaks than others. The busiest hour figures ranged from 92.9 per cent (Aussie Broadband) to 100 per cent (TPG).
On the popular NBN500 plan specifically, Leaptel led with an average download speed of 104 per cent of plan speed during busy hours, followed by Dodo and iPrimus at 103.6 per cent. Aussie Broadband recorded 92.7 per cent and Telstra 94.7 per cent on the same plan tier.
Upload performance was more uniform across providers. NBN fixed-line services achieved an overall average upload performance of 90.1 per cent of plan speed during busy hours, ranging from 86.8 per cent (TPG) to 92.1 per cent (Dodo and iPrimus). Upload speeds are not overprovisioned by NBN Co, which accounts for the gap between download and upload performance.
State-By-State Breakdown
Download performance during busy hours varied by state, ranging from 94.8 per cent of plan speed in Tasmania to 99.4 per cent in Queensland.
New South Wales recorded 99.3 per cent, Victoria 98.4 per cent, Western Australia 97.7 per cent, the ACT 98 per cent and the combined Northern Territory and South Australia figure was 96.7 per cent.
Upload performance followed a similar pattern, with Victoria recording the highest upload performance at 90.8 per cent and Western Australia the lowest at 87.9 per cent.
Very High Speed Services
The report also tracked 294 services on NBN’s Home Ultrafast plan, which offers wholesale plan speeds of 1,000/100 Mbps. These services are reported separately from other fixed-line plans.
Average download speeds for very high speed services ranged from 880 Mbps to 891 Mbps throughout the day. During busy hours, the average was 881.2 Mbps. Due to the physical limitations of gigabit Ethernet connections used by the testing devices, the maximum observable speed on these plans is approximately 940 Mbps.
NBN Co now offers an even faster Home Hyperfast tier with wholesale speeds of 2,000/200 Mbps for FTTP and 2,000/100 Mbps for HFC. However, these services do not feature in the report as the testing devices cannot measure speeds at that level.
Fixed Wireless And Satellite Results
NBN fixed wireless services, which serve primarily regional and remote areas, recorded an average download performance of 90.1 per cent of plan speed during all hours, dropping to 85.4 per cent during busy hours. That represents an improvement from the previous report’s figures of 87.5 per cent and 81.7 per cent respectively.
Upload performance on fixed wireless was lower, averaging 70.6 per cent of plan speed during all hours and 65.8 per cent during busy hours.
For satellite services, the report tracked both NBN Sky Muster and Starlink. Sky Muster’s geosynchronous satellite service recorded an average download speed of 86.1 per cent of plan speed during all hours, dropping to 74.7 per cent during busy hours. Latency on Sky Muster averaged around 666 milliseconds, as expected given the distance signals must travel to satellites approximately 35,786 kilometres above the equator.
Starlink’s low earth orbit service performed differently, recording an average download speed of 225.8 Mbps during all hours, decreasing to 197.3 Mbps during busy hours. Starlink’s latency was considerably lower at 25.4 milliseconds during all hours, reflecting the closer proximity of its satellite constellation to Earth.
Outages Remain Stable
The average daily rate of outages on NBN fixed-line plans was 0.26 outages per day. Some 95 per cent of households experienced fewer than one outage per day, and 41 per cent of outages did not last longer than three minutes.
Among access technologies, fibre to the premises had the highest proportion of outage-free units at 46.3 per cent, while HFC had the lowest at 29.6 per cent.
Video Streaming Capability
The report also assessed the ability of NBN plans to support simultaneous Netflix streams. Services on the NBN500 plan could support seven or more concurrent ultra-high definition streams in 93.8 per cent of cases during busy hours.
By contrast, NBN25 plans could not reliably support even a single ultra-high definition stream, while NBN50 plans could support two to three concurrent UHD streams.
Methodology
The Measuring Broadband Australia program uses purpose-built testing hardware called Whiteboxes, supplied by SamKnows, which are installed in volunteers’ homes. The devices run automated tests against Australian-hosted test servers to measure download and upload speeds, latency, packet loss and other metrics.
The report defines an underperforming service as one that records a speed above 75 per cent of the plan speed in fewer than 5 per cent of download speed tests.
NBN services may exceed their maximum plan download speed due to overprovisioning, where NBN Co provides a slightly higher data rate than the wholesale plan download speed to accommodate protocol overhead. NBN Co does not currently overprovision the uplink for fixed-line connections, which explains why upload speeds tend to sit lower than download speeds as a proportion of plan speed.
Last Updated on April 2, 2026 by Nick Ross
