The UK lags behind most of Europe in terms of broadband quality, according to a global study. 
Europe leads the way in broadband quality compared to the rest of the world, according to the third annual global broadband study by Saïd Business School at Oxford University.
But none of the cities deemed 'ready for tomorrow' - meaning that they have a high percentage of households with broadband and high-quality speed networks - come from the UK.
Seoul tops the 38-strong list overall and there are 18 cities in Western Europe and 12 from Eastern Europe. The rest are from Asia and America.
There has been a three per cent increase in the amount of homes in the UK that have access to broadband over the past year but the UK has dropped one place in global ranking for providing high-quality broadband.
Other findings from the annual report found that 38 countries have successfully conquered the digital quality divide which is an improvement of 58 per cent in just one year.
Mobile broadband quality has also improved worldwide with 10 per cent of users getting the same quality compared to those with fixed-line broadband. The UK came 24th in regards mobile broadband quality.
The study found that a basic household uses 20GB of data per month so needs a connection of 2Mbps whereas a 'smart and connected' home needs over 20Mpbs to manage its 500GB consumption.
All the data comes from 40 million real-life broadband quality tests from May and June 2010 on internet speed testing site Speedtest.net across 72 countries and 239 cities.
This week is Get Online Week aimed at getting those currently not using the web online. It coincides with the BBC's 'First Click' campaign.
Posted: Tue Oct 19, 2010 7:48 pm