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Network operator Openreach (BT) has today published the first update to their national roll-out plan for Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband ISP technology since March 2026, which reflects all the recent changes and progress with their existing deployment locations up to October 2026 (i.e. changes in status, removals and any small additions).
The national network access provider is currently investing up to £15bn to expand the coverage of their new “full fibre” network to 25 million premises by December 2026 (here), which includes around 6.2m in rural or semi-rural areas. On top of that, they’ve also expressed an ambition to reach up to 30m by 2030 (there are c.33m in the UK), although they’ve yet to announce their build plan for the 2027 to 2030 period (they still seem to be awaiting some regulatory and Govt policy certainty over taxation, pricing flexibility and MDU access etc.)
The new network is currently capable of delivering download speeds of up to 1.8Gbps (uploads of 1Gbps are also possible in some Project Gigabit build areas) via older GPON technology. But Openreach are also busy expanding a trial with speeds of up to 8.5Gbps via their new XGS-PON based full fibre network technology, which by this time next year will be made available to “more than a million premises” (rising to a third of their FTTP network over the next 5 years).