Internet speed continues to improve in July: DICT

MANILA – The average internet speed in the Philippines continued to steadily improve in July, the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) said.

In a Facebook post Wednesday, the DICT cited Ookla’s Speedtest Global Index that recorded an average download speed of 71.17 megabits per second (Mbps) for fixed broadband in July compared to 66.55 Mbps average speed in June.

For mobile internet, the average download speed reached 33.69 Mbps in July against 32.84 Mbps in the previous month.

“With these improvements, the Philippines’ global rank currently sits at 63rd out of 180 countries for fixed broadband and 72nd out of 139 countries for mobile internet, respectively,” the DICT said.

In Asia, the Philippines ranked 17th for fixed broadband and 23rd for mobile internet out of 50 countries.

In the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) region, the Philippines ranked 5th for both fixed broadband and mobile internet out of 10 countries.

This is attributed the steady improvement of telecommunications companies in improving their services amid the pandemic and the rollout of the “common tower” policy.

“The said policy not only allows sharing of cell towers among telcos but also promotes streamlined processing of permits for building common towers,” the DICT said.

In addition, it said the DICT, the Anti-Red Tape Authority, and other government agencies issued Joint Memorandum Circular (JMC) No. 001, series of 2021, that streamlined the process of securing permits, licenses, and authorizations for building passive telecommunications tower infrastructures.

DICT Secretary Gregorio “Gringo” Honasan II said the collective efforts of the government “significantly eased up” bureaucratic processes in the issuance of permits for cell towers.

“We encourage tower companies and telcos to avail of the collocation services contained in the common tower policy to qualify for the benefits under the JMC,” Honasan said.