Singapore is leading Omdia’s Fiber Development Index in 2021, followed by South Korea, United Arab Emirates, China, and Qatar.

The first European countries in the ranking are Spain and Sweden in seventh and eighth position. They are closely followed by Luxembourg and Romania. The US heads the Americas region and is positioned 18th in the world overall. The 2021 full ranking results are available here.

The percentage of the population that is connected to the internet will increase from 58 percent to 70 percent by 2026, according to Omdia’s Global Fiber Development Index. Of the 70 percent, 30 percent of the population will have access to the internet via a mobile device, and 40 percent will have a home fixed broadband connection.

In Latin America, 44 percent of the population will have access to fixed broadband services by 2026, and 5.3 percent will be on a connection delivering 500Mbps or more, and 1 percent will have speeds of more than 1Gbps.

In North America, 77 percent of the population will have access to fixed broadband services by 2026, and 26 percent will be on a connection delivering 500Mbps or more, and 11 percent will have speeds of more than 1Gbps.

In Oceania, Eastern & South-Eastern Asia, 66 percent of the population will have access to fixed broadband services by 2026, and 40 percent will be on a connection delivering 500Mbps or more, and 10 percent will have speeds of more than 1Gbps.

9 percent of the African population will have access to fixed broadband, with 84 percent of those users limited to speeds of less than 30Mbps.

“Beyond economic benefits, an all-fiber network has significant environmental benefits over both xDSL and hybrid fiber coaxial (HFC) networks,” said Michael Philpott, Research Director, Omdia. “In 2019, Telefonica Spain stated that its FTTH network was 85 percent more energy efficient than its old copper infrastructure. The operator said its FTTH initiative had saved 208GWh over three years, representing a reduction of 56,500 tons of CO2 emissions.”