FCC: DOCSIS 3 Helps Drive Rapid Fixed Broadband Speed Boost

The Federal Communications Commission has released its fifth report on fixed broadband speeds and finds both a "significant" growth in advertised broadband speeds and, in most cases, Internet service provider (ISP) subscribers get close to or better than those advertised speeds.

The Measuring Broadband America report found that ISP speed offerings continue to get faster at a "rapid pace." The average maximum advertised speed across all participating ISPs was 72 Mbps as of September 2014, up a whopping 94 percent from 37.2 Mbps in September 2013. But while cable and fiber-based ISPs were usually meeting or beating that advertised price, DSL had not kept pace and some continued to advertise speeds that they did not deliver. The FCC said that was largely due to cable's deployment of DOCSIS 3 -- the maximum advertised speeds for cable ISP downloads increased from 12-20 Mbps in 2011 to 50-105 Mbps in September 2014.