In the first quarter of the year, the nation’s average Internet connection speed was 16.9 megabits per second (Mbps), the 16th-fastest in the world and fifth-fastest in the Asia-Pacific region, a quarterly report on global Internet speeds said.
The figure represents a 7.9 percent increase from the 15.6Mbps recorded in the fourth quarter of last year, according to content delivery network Akamai’s State of the Internet report, published on May 31.
South Korea remained at the top of the rankings with an average connection speed of 28.6Mbps, followed by Norway (23.5Mbps), Sweden (22.5Mbps), Hong Kong (21.9Mbps) and Switzerland (21.7Mbps).
After these in the rankings came Finland with an average speed of 20.5Mbps, then Singapore, Japan, Denmark and the US.
The report compiled by Akamai Intelligent Platform included data on average connection speeds, average peak connection speeds, broadband adoption rates and mobile connectivity, the company said.
It showed that in the first quarter, the global average connection speed rose 15 percent year-on-year to 7.2Mbps.
“Increases in connection speeds and broadband penetration have helped enable the Internet to support levels of traffic that even just a few years ago would have been unimaginable,” report editor David Belson said.
In terms of average peak connection speeds, Taiwan ranked 13th in the world with 94.7Mbps, a figure that represents a 14 percent surge from the same period last year.
The top five in that category were Singapore (184.5Mbps), Macao (132.0Mbps), Mongolia (131.1Mbps), Hong Kong (129.5Mbps) and South Korea (121.0Mbps).
They were followed by Jersey in the Channel Islands (108.4Mbps), and Qatar, Thailand, Israel and Sweden (95.3Mbps).
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