Internet in Canada - Comparison

Comparison

The following table summarizes residential broadband offerings in Canada. No provider is nationwide and the chart does not include abilities of customer equipment or the speeds after Peer-to-peer traffic shaping. In particular, some products are 'up to' the speed quoted and may not deliver that speed in all areas. Since plans may change at any time, this list is not comprehensive.

Internet Service Provider Type Lowest tier Highest tier Availability
Download Upload Cap Download Upload Cap
Internet Lightspeed DSL 3 Mbit/s 1 Mbit/s 125 GB 6 Mbit/s 1 Mbit/s 125 GB Western Canada
Shaw Communications Cable 10 Mbit/s ½ Mbit/s 125 GB 250 Mbit/s 15 Mbit/s 1 TB Western Canada
Rogers Hi-Speed Internet Cable 6 Mbit/s ¼ Mbit/s 20 GB 150 Mbit/s 10 Mbit/s 500 GB Eastern Canada
Rogers Ultimate Fibre Fibre 250 Mbit/s 250 Mbit/s 500 GB Fibre markets
Vidéotron Cable 5 Mbit/s 1 Mbit/s 15 GB 200 Mbit/s 30 Mbit/s 250 GB Quebec
Cogeco Cable 4 Mbit/s ⅗ Kbit/s 15 GB 50 Mbit/s 2 Mbit/s 250 GB Ontario and Quebec
EastLink Cable 1.5 Mbit/s ⅛ Mbit/s ? 100 Mbit/s 5 Mbit/s 250 GB Various
Bell Internet VDSL2 5 Mbit/s 1 Mbit/s 15 GB 50 Mbit/s 10 Mbit/s 175 GB Ontario and Quebec
Bell Internet Fibre 15 Mbit/s 15 Mbit/s 75 GB 175 Mbit/s 175 Mbit/s 300 GB Ontario and Quebec
Bell Aliant DSL 1.5 Mbit/s 640 Kbit/s 15 Mbit/s 2 Mbit/s Atlantic Canada
Bell Aliant FibreOP Fibre 20 Mbit/s 15 Mbit/s 250 Mbit/s 30 Mbit/s Atlantic Canada
National Capital Freenet VDSL2 6 Mbit/s ⅘ Mbit/s 300 GB National Capital Region
Nexicom VDSL2 6 Mbit/s ⅘ Mbit/s 25 Mbit/s 7 Mbit/s Ontario
Telus VDSL2 or GPON (Fibre) 6 Mbit/s 1 Mbit/s 150 GB 50 Mbit/s 10 Mbit/s 400 GB Alberta and British Columbia
SaskTel DSL ¼ Mbit/s ⅛ Mbit/s 25 Mbit/s 2 Mbit/s Saskatchewan
SaskTel infiNET Fibre 2 Mbit/s 1 Mbit/s 260 Mbit/s 30 Mbit/s Saskatchewan
Manitoba Telecom Services DSL ¼ Mbit/s ¼ Mbit/s 20 Mbit/s 2 Mbit/s Manitoba
TekSavvy Cable 3 Mbit/s ⅘ Mbit/s 25 GB 28 Mbit/s 1 Mbit/s ∞ GB Various
TekSavvy DSL 6 Mbit/s ⅘ Mbit/s 75 GB 25 Mbit/s 10 Mbit/s ∞ GB Various
Telehop Cable 3 Mbit/s ¼ Mbit/s 300 GB 15 Mbit/s 1 Mbit/s 300 GB Ontario
ElectronicBox DSL 6 Mbit/s ⅘ Mbit/s 100 GB 25 Mbit/s 10 Mbit/s 500 GB Ontario and Quebec
Novus Entertainment Fibre 25 Mbit/s 10 Mbit/s 250 GB 300 Mbit/s 300 Mbit/s Vancouver
Velcom VDSL2 6 Mbit/s ⅘ Mbit/s 100 GB 25 Mbit/s 10 Mbit/s Ontario and Quebec
Yak Communications DSL 5 Mbit/s 1 Mbit/s 60 GB Discontinued
Start Communications Cable 6 Mbit/s ¼ Mbit/s 100/∞ GB 45 Mbit/s 4 Mbit/s 350 GB Ontario
Start Communications DSL 2 Mbit/s ⅘ Mbit/s 100/∞ GB 15 Mbit/s 1 Mbit/s 300 GB Ontario

The legal definition of broadband in Canada is 1.5 Mbit/s (megabits per second). This is essentially the bandwidth required to transmit compressed VGA (640x480) motion video with modest quality. However, in recent years the competition between the major broadband Internet providers has caused frequent increases in the available bandwidth provided to home users.

Regional Canadian ISPs peer through a few major Internet Exchange Points, the most notable of which is the Toronto Internet Exchange. However, these regional networks usually share the same backbones for longer distance connectivity.

The largest DSL provider in Canada is Bell Internet (formerly Bell Sympatico). Bell owns and maintains physical layer connectivity through a combination of optical fibre networks, DSLAM and Customer Premise Equipment. Few other DSL providers have comparable network infrastructure so a lot of them instead use lines provided by Bell. Their speed is however limited to 5 Mbit/s down, ⅘ Mbit/s up for residential lines. ADSL is the predominant technology while ADSL2+ is quickly emerging as the new standard, fueled by the urgency to compete with cable companies in the digital TV market. In British Columbia (BC), Alberta (AB), and parts of Quebec (QC), the incumbent telco is Telus, owning the DSLAMs, the fibre, and provides many services Bell does, however at slower speeds. An example of the speed difference is a standard DSL line in BC/A is 1.5 Mbit/s, while a standard DSL line in Ontario(ON)/QC can be up to 25 Mbit/s; the top tier internet speed is 14 Mbit/s/s in BC/AB and 25 Mbit/s/s in ON/QC.

The other major players offering DSL and IPTV services are SaskTel in Saskatchewan and Manitoba Telecom Services (MTS) in Manitoba. Download speeds are up to 8 Mbit/s, though recent upgrades now make HDTV and much higher rates possible.

For Cable offerings, standard North American DOCSIS based equipment are used.

Read more about this topic:  Internet In Canada

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