ADSL versus Fibre – Price per Mbps

Telkom recently announced price hikes for its analogue line service, with the monthly fee increasing from R189 to R199 from 1 April.

The price increase not only affects those who use their Telkom landline to make phone calls, but also DSL users – as the line fee is compulsory for all customers.

This means that if you use an ADSL service in South Africa, you will pay more from next month.

For users on high-end packages – like a 20Mbps or 40Mbps service – the price increase is not substantial. At the lower-end of the spectrum, however, the price difference makes up a larger percentage of the total cost to connect.

A 2Mbps DSL line from Telkom plus a 20GB data account from Axxess, for example, costs less than the R199 analogue line rental.

Price per Mbps

The compulsory line rental also contributes to ADSL services being more expensive than comparative fibre services.

Looking at DSL and fibre services from a price-per-Mbps perspective, with all costs taken into account, it is easy to see why South African Internet users are begging for fibre to be laid in their neighbourhoods.

The table below details how much ADSL users pay per Mbps, and compares it against fibre products.

The ADSL prices below are based on a DSL service and analogue line from Telkom, and an uncapped data account from Afrihost.

The fibre prices are based on Afrihost’s uncapped packages on Operserve fibre. (Both are the “Home Uncapped” option.)

This article first appeared on MyBroadband and is republished with permission.

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