Our guide to student broadband
We've put together the most important factors to consider when choosing a student broadband package.
Our 2010/11 guide to student broadband is also available as a PDF (feel free to redistribute it with a link back to the site), or viewable online below:
HTML guide - in case you can't read the above
Speed
I'm on my own
If you’re on your own, will you be streaming movies, TV or music? As
a guideline, BBC iPlayer streams at 1.5Mbps, with the HD service
going up to 3.2Mbps - so you should get a package above this
speed if the answer is yes.
I’m sharing with mates
If you’re sharing your student broadband connection, you should bare this
in mind when choosing broadband.
A few users browsing Wikipedia will be fine on all connections, but
4-5 students streaming Spotify could bring a slower connection to a
grinding halt. As a guide, divide the speed (eg. 8Mbps) by the
number of housemates (eg 5) and decide if that’s an acceptable
speed (1.6Mbps - which would be fine for most students).
Bandwidth
Bandwidth is likely to be the most significant limiting factor for
students - it’s amazing how quickly a few of you can reach your
download limit, rendering your connection useless - or worse, incurring
a massive bill.
I'm on my own, or it's just the two of us
In this case, you may be able to survive on a bandwidth-capped
plan. This entirely depends on how much you download per month.
I'm sharing with mates
If you’re sharing in a student house, we really don’t recommend
going on a bandwidth-capped plan.
What’s worse, you may have no control over how much your housemates
download, so you could be tied into a contract that causes
massive problems.
We’d recommend an unlimited plan, but check the company’s reasonable
use policy to make sure “unlimited” isn’t a paltry amount
We reckon the average student could use about 2.1GB per week.
"Wireless" and "mobile" student broadband
Most broadband providers will give you a free wireless router with
your broadband (although some will want it back, so be careful with
it!) - hence them calling it wireless broadband.
Mobile broadband is different - you get a dongle, which allows you
to connect to the internet via the mobile phone network.
Should I go for mobile broadband?
The great thing about mobile broadband is
you can take it anywhere - in the coffee shop, in lectures or in the park.
The bad thing is that bandwidth allowance tends to be too restrictive
to use it to replace the need for home broadband entirely. That,
and you might not live in a well-covered area, making it slow in your
home.
On balance, we generally wouldn’t recommend using mobile broadband
as your main broadband package, but if you can afford it, it’s a
fantastic way to get broadband on the move.
Contract lengths and line rental
Most students have a 48 week contract, running from September -
July. That’s 11 months. For a few months of that, you might not be
using your broadband connection due to holidays.
You could get a pay as you go or short term contract, but these tend
to attract a connection fee (usually around £25). Since you’ll have to
“connect” twice, the costs tend to outweigh the benefit, and you
might as well just take out a contract for one year. Don’t fall into the
trap of taking out an 18 month broadband contract.
Line rental and free calls
Most providers require a BT line (£11.54 at time of writing), which
tends to be an additional cost to the quoted amount.
Alternatively, some providers encourage you to pay them for line
rental, making it a bit cheaper. You could also get free calls.
Be careful with a phone in a student house. Unless all calls are free,
which is very unlikely, you could have a tough time finding out who
ran up the phone bill when it comes to bill time!
Checklist before ordering student broadband
Follow this checklist to ensure you don’t fall into the usual traps:
- My broadband is fast enough for all purposes required
- The bandwidth allowance is big enough for all of us
- It comes with a decent wireless router
- The contract length is for a reasonable period of time
- We’ve checked hidden fees - including line rental & setup cost
