BT Broadband vs Virgin Media

BT broadband is available nationwide, and their full fibre build is on target to cover 25 million, or over 65% of UK premises, by the end of 2025.

Virgin Media cover less properties than BT, but they're also rolling out full fibre broadband, with speeds now up to 2Gbps and a target of 23 million premises by the end of 2026.

Overall, Virgin Media are cheaper than BT, and they also offer faster broadband speeds across their entire network area.

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At a glance

Best deals

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Price

Winner: Virgin Media have cheaper broadband deals than BT, with their entry-level M125 broadband plan costing just £25 per month.

Virgin Media's cheapest broadband deal is their M125 broadband plan, which offers average download speeds of 132Mbps for just £25 per month for the first 18 months and free setup.

In comparison, BT's equivalent Full Fibre 100 plan offers average download speeds of 150Mbps but costs £30.99 per month with a £31.99 setup fee.

Here are those packages side-by-side:

While BT does have cheaper options, Full Fibre Essential and Full Fibre 2 for example, even these cost more than Virgin Media's M125 at £28.99 and £29.99 per month respectively and with slower speeds of 36Mb and 74Mb.

At the other end of the scale, Virgin Media also has a cheaper gigabit-capable broadband plan, Gig1, which costs just £41 per month, compared to BT's Full Fibre 900 at £49.99.

For those who want to bundle TV, Virgin Media are also generally cheaper and tend to offer especially good value for money with their TV 360 bundles which also include a home phone line and free calls to UK landlines at the weekend.

Both providers implement annual price rises, although BT now increase broadband prices by a transparent £3 per month, while Virgin Media still use an inflation-linked method of Retail Price Index (RPI) + 3.9%, increasing prices by 8.8% in 2024 - which saw prices go up £2.55 on M125 broadband and as much as £7.48 on the Mega Volt Bundle.

Read more about why broadband prices are going up.

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Broadband packages

Winner: Virgin Media offers better broadband bundle options than BT, with extra service add-ons including a home phone and WiFi guarantee included in many of their plans.

Virgin Media customers can choose from a range of broadband packages, including:

• Broadband-only
• Broadband and phone
• Volt broadband and phone
• Broadband, TV & phone
• Volt broadband, TV & phone

This makes for a wide variety of combinations to help ensure customers can pick the package that includes all the services they want and need, whether that's a home phone line, a pay TV plan, or boosted broadband speeds with mobile benefits.

BT broadband customers can add a home phone line to any of their packages for an extra £5 per month with calls on a pay as you go basis, and BT TV can also be added to any package.

In this way, customers can pick and choose the exact add-ons they want from BT, while with Virgin they'll usually need to pick the right pre-made bundle combination instead.

Here's some of Virgin Media's and BT's most popular broadband-only plans side-by-side:

With BT, any of these deals can be combined with a home phone, pay TV plan, WiFi boosters, and even a 4G broadband back-up add-on called Hybrid Connect.

For Virgin Media, while deals above can be bundled with Stream TV and their WiFi Max add-on, customers will need to look at other plans if they want to bundle a home phone line, mobile benefits with Volt, or take one of their TV 360 plans.

Ultimately, while BT's broadband packages are more straightforward to customise, Virgin Media offer plenty of bundle combinations with good discounts available on TV & phone, as well as Volt bundles for their WiFi boosters and mobile benefits, which can save customers more money overall.

Read more in our Virgin Media broadband review and our BT broadband review.

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Broadband speed

Winner: Virgin Media offer a faster nationally-available top broadband speed at 1.13Gbps, as well as 2Gbps in some areas, while BT currently max out at 900Mbps.

Virgin Media's national broadband network offers average download speeds up to 1.13Gb, or 1130Mb per second at peak times. It's available to over 16 million homes, with an active expansion plan to reach 23 million by 2026. This makes it the fastest widely-available broadband in the UK.

In newly connected areas where Nexfibre has rolled out full fibre broadband, Virgin Media customers can choose speeds up to 2Gbps, as well as an optional symmetrical upload speeds add-on on all plans. While this only accounts for around 1 million premises so far, Virgin Media is also upgrading their existing network to full fibre, and plan to complete this by around 2028.

While the Openreach full fibre network is capable of speeds up to 1.8Gbps, BT's current fastest package offers average download speeds of 900Mbps at peak times, so it's around 230Mbps slower than Virgin's Gig1 option.

Here are Virgin Media's average broadband speeds:

And the average speeds of BT broadband:

Advertised average speeds must be experienced by at least 50% of a provider's customer base during the busiest peak times of 8pm to 10pm at night, so they should be reasonably reflective of what most people will get.

We also know both BT and Virgin Media are signatories of Ofcom's voluntary code of practice on broadband speeds, which sets out providers must give customers personalised speed estimates and a minimum speed guarantee at the point of sign up.

If a customer fails to receive the minimum speed guarantee and the provider doesn't resolve the issue within 30 days, the customer can leave their contract early without penalty.

The code aims to ensure people are given a realistic download speed personalised to their particular property before signing up to ensure expectations are met, and if they're not, the customer has the right to move elsewhere.

We tested a location that can access both Virgin Media coaxial cable, as well as BT's full fibre service, and were given these minimum download speeds:

Specific locations may vary, but this does tell us BT offer faster minimum speed guarantees across equivalent packages than Virgin Media does. However, it's important to remember these are minimums and most households will receive the advertised average speeds or faster.

Overall, Virgin Media beat BT broadband for average download speeds, and their new full fibre network is also built using faster technology than BT's underlying Openreach FTTP network.

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Router

Winner: Virgin Media's latest Hub 5 and 5x are more advanced than the BT Smart Hub 2, although they're currently only provided to Gig1 and full fibre customers.

The Virgin Media Hub 5 was announced in October 2021, but has been slowly making its way to new and existing customers on their Gig1 broadband plan throughout 2022.

The BT Smart Hub 2 on the other hand was first announced in November 2018, so it's an older router, with less advanced wireless technology.

However, the majority of Virgin Media customers will receive a Hub 3 or Hub 4, which have more similar specifications to the BT Smart Hub 2.

Here's how the routers compare side-by-side:

All BT broadband customers get the BT Smart Hub 2, and the wireless network can be easily extended with Complete WiFi discs using mesh technology.

Virgin Media routers also support mesh, and customers can get WiFi Pods to extend their network around larger homes. Mesh is supported by all three of Virgin's Hubs.

Customers living in Virgin Media's new full fibre areas, connected by Nexfibre, will receive a Hub 5x, it's similar in specifications to the Hub 5 but supports the newer XGS-PON connections, where the Hub 5 works with Virgin's older coaxial cable network that uses DOCSIS.

Overall, the BT Smart Hub 2 stacks up well against the Virgin Hub 3 and Hub 4, yet Virgin Media's latest Hub 5 and 5x have the most advanced technology with WiFi 6 and WPA3 security.

Read more on how broadband provider routers compare.

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WiFi guarantee

Winner: Virgin Media's WiFi Max guarantee promises minimum download speeds of 30Mb in every room, while BT only promise a 'strong' signal.

BT and Virgin Media both offer a whole home WiFi guarantee, which can help to boost wireless signal and speeds around a home, and if not, customers get their money refunded.

BT's Complete WiFi costs £10 per month and includes up to three mesh discs to extend a wireless signal to ensure every room in the home receives a "strong" signal according to the My BT app.

Virgin Media's WiFi Max costs £8 per month, or free to Gig1, Gig2 and Volt customers, and also includes up to three WiFi Pods to extend wireless signal, but Virgin promise minimum speeds of at least 30Mb in every room.

Both BT and Virgin Media will give customers a £100 bill credit if their WiFi guarantees fail to deliver, yet Virgin Media only tie customers down to a 30-day term on the add-on, while BT customers are locked in for 24 months. That means if it doesn't work out, BT customers effectively get less back as they have to continue paying for the service, while Virgin customers could cancel the add-on.

Overall, the Virgin Media WiFi Max add-on is a better service, with fairer terms and a better pay-out if customers don't get the promised minimum speeds of 30Mb in every room in their home.

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Call plans

Winner: Virgin Media is marginally cheaper than BT for a home phone service with inclusive calls.

Virgin Media broadband customers who opt for a home phone will get free calls to UK landlines at the weekend included as standard.

They can then choose to upgrade to one of three inclusive call plans, which include calls to both UK landlines and UK mobiles.

BT have taken a different approach to home phone since the rollout of full fibre broadband and the upcoming closure of the copper phone line network. They now provide broadband without line rental as standard, and customers need to pay £5 extra per month to get a home phone line with pay as you go calls.

BT customers can choose to upgrade to an Unlimited minutes plan if they want inclusive call options:

Overall, Virgin Media is cheaper for a home phone plan bundled with broadband than BT.

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TV

Winner: Virgin Media offer a more comprehensive TV service and their bundle prices are cheaper than BT TV as well.

Virgin Media and BT both offer customers the option to bundle a TV service, and unlike Sky TV, both platforms are exclusive to their broadband customers.

BT TV moved to a platform mainly focused around offering content via NOW TV and other on-demand apps in 2020, and offer access to live TV as well as premium channels including Sky Sports, Sky Cinema, Sky Entertainment, TNT Sports, and some on-demand apps including BBC iPlayer and Prime Video.

Virgin Media TV on the other hand offers a more traditional pay TV service, with a broader range of premium live channels, and the ability to pause and rewind, as well as record, premium channels such as Sky Sports and Sky Cinema.

Here are some of their entertainment and sport packages side-by-side:

While BT TV does offer customers more flexibility, because they can change channel packs on a 30-day basis, Virgin Media's bundles are noticeably cheaper overall, especially when you add premium channels like Sky Cinema and Sky Sports into the mix.

The providers' most premium bundles, Virgin Media Mega Volt, and BT Full Works, both offer everything available, including Sky Sports, Sky Cinema, Sky Entertainment, and Netflix, yet Virgin Media's top-tier bundle is over £20 cheaper per month than BT.

Ultimately Virgin Media offer a more comprehensive TV service, coupled with cheaper prices, easily beating BT for TV plans.

Read more about the Virgin 360 box vs BT TV Pro Box.

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Customer service

Winner: BT have a stronger customer service record, with less complaints, than Virgin Media.

The latest complaints report from Ofcom shows while BT had less than the industry average number of broadband complaints with 11 complaints per 100,000 customers, Virgin Media received the most complaints of all major providers with 20 per 100,000 customers.

Virgin Media complaints hit a peak of 32 in Q3 2023, which the provider said was due to Ofcom's investigation into their handling of contract cancellation requests in July 2023. So, while they have begun to decline slightly to 20 in Q4 2023, they're still the most complained about broadband provider, while BT has been outperforming the industry average in most quarters since 2019.

BT are also one of our top broadband providers for customer service, because alongside reasonably low complaint levels, they also score highly for customer satisfaction, and satisfaction of complaints handling, with the highest score for complaints resolved on first contact.

Here's how the providers look side-by-side:

BT outperform Virgin Media for customer service, thanks in part to their dedicated UK-based call centre, while Virgin Media use a mixture of both UK and overseas call centres.

Both providers also score highly for reliability metrics however, with Virgin Media having one of the fastest fault resolution times in the market, and BT having high satisfaction among customers for reliability of their service.

Overall, we'd pick BT for customer service based on their performance in independent research, however Virgin Media do seem quick to resolve faults despite generating more complaints.

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Verdict: Virgin Media or BT broadband?

Overall winner: Virgin Media offer faster broadband speeds than BT, as well as cheaper prices, and just as many bundled extras.

While BT has high satisfaction levels among its existing customer base, Virgin Media outperforms BT for broadband because they offer a faster connection that's currently available to more homes across the UK, they also have the cheapest prices.

Availability in a particular area will play a large part in the decision between BT vs Virgin Media for broadband, yet where both providers are available, Virgin Media's lower prices and more comprehensive TV service is likely to win out.

One minor niggle with Virgin Media is their slightly higher complaints levels, and offshore call handling, which we hope the provider will continue to make improvements on as they responded they were doing when complaints reached a peak in early 2021.

Some customers may decide they're happier to pay more for BT, with a better customer service record, UK-based call handling, and high satisfaction among existing customers.

Ultimately, we pick Virgin Media over BT for their cheaper prices and faster speeds, yet BT remain a strong contender and a good option for many.

Read more head-to-head guides such as Sky vs Virgin Media, and BT vs Sky broadband.