World's Fastest Broadband

Discussions about the public's access to broadband often focus on which areas or countries have the most high-speed Internet connections. The Organization for Economic Cooperation & Development, for instance, publishes an annual list of countries that have the most per capita connections. But for many users of the Internet nowadays, it's not enough simply to have a broadband connection. Increasingly what really matters is the speed of the connection: how much information can a user download or upload, and how quickly. Broadband speeds can vary widely—from 1.5 megabits per second (Mbps) to more than 25 Mbps. And that can make all the difference to a person who's trying to use the Web to learn a new skill, access medical records of an ill patient, or simply watch a movie downloaded from Netflix. In the first quarter of 2009, about one-fifth of the Internet connections around the world were at speeds greater than 5 Mbps, according to the State of the Internet report published quarterly by Akamai, a maker of software designed to speed the flow of information over the Internet. The report includes broadband adoption data gathered from across Akamai's network of more than 50,000 servers in 70 countries, and categorizes Internet connections by download speeds. Which countries can boast the fastest broadband connections?