Australia now has almost 14 million Internet subscribers, according to the latest figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), which has been counting registered subscribers up until the end of June.
The actual number of Aussies connecting to the Internet is in fact presumed to be much larger, due to the ABS’s definition of who qualifies as a subscriber.
While there are in fact 24.27 million Aussies, tipped to rise to almost 25 million million by June next year, the ABS only counts people who subscribe directly to Internet services – ignoring the many thousands who connect via work systems or who hitchhike on their neighbours’ or family systems.
According to the latest figures from ABS, there are now 4.23 million subscribers connecting via DSL landlines, down from 5.03 million in June 2016.
Cable connections were down slightly at 1.01 million connections in June this year, while fibre connections more than doubled – from 960,000 to 2.14 million. Mobile connections were the most popular system of connecting to the Net, with 6.1 million subscribers, up marginally from 6.03 million a year ago.
Around 8 million users now connect at speeds between 24 and 100Mbps, compared with 7.55 million a year ago, Stats says. The total volume of media downloaded in the 12 months to June 30 was 3 million terabytes, up 42pc.
