Community Fibre vs Virgin Media

Community Fibre offer cheaper prices across all equivalent packages in comparison to Virgin Media, and they also have symmetrical upload speeds.

Virgin Media are a better pick for customers who want to bundle broadband with a premium TV service. They're also much more widely available across the UK.

Overall, while both providers are great choices in their own right, for lucky Londoners, Community Fibre offer the best value for money for a straightforward fast connection.

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At a glance

Best deals

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Price

Winner: Community Fibre is cheaper than Virgin Media across all broadband speeds, with their 1Gb plan only £1 more than Virgin Media's cheapest deal.

People living in London looking for the cheapest broadband will find it hard to beat Community Fibre for price, with even their 1Gbps plan costing less than £30 per month.

Low introductory prices are also coupled with affordable out of contract pricing too, with all plans only increasing by £2 per month at the end of the minimum term since 2022.

In comparison to Virgin Media, whose out of contract prices are much higher, Community Fibre seem committed to being London's best value broadband provider.

Here are their cheapest plans side-by-side:

Virgin Media's M125 broadband plan offers average download speeds of 132Mbps and currently costs just £25 per month. Community Fibre's cheapest deal is a similar plan that offers 150Mb average download speeds but costs less at just £18.99 per month.

In addition, for anyone struggling with the cost of living crisis and finding it hard to afford broadband at all, Community Fibre offer a social broadband tariff costing just £12.50 per month, which is available to anyone who needs it.

Conversely, while Virgin Media have two social tariffs these are restricted to people in receipt of Universal Credit, ESA, JSA, Income Support or Pension Credit.

Overall, Community Fibre are a clear winner for price, they offer cheaper prices across all equivalent Virgin Media packages, and also provide the market's most accessible social tariff.

Check the latest prices on our broadband comparison page where it's easy to filter packages from just Community Fibre and Virgin Media to compare their deals side-by-side.

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Broadband packages

Winner: Virgin Media offer a multitude of broadband package combinations, with options to take a home phone, TV plan, and WiFi boosters on all speed options.

Community Fibre and Virgin Media both offer a range of broadband packages covering superfast, ultrafast and gigafast download speeds.

However, more of Virgin Media's packages can be bundled with service extras, including a home phone line, TV 360 or Stream TV plan, and the WiFi Max add-on which provides up to three WiFi Pods and a wireless speed guarantee of 30Mbps.

Some of Virgin Media's options, including Volt bundles, Gig1 and Gig2 plans include extras for free, including the WiFi Max add-on and mobile benefits in partnership with O2.

Community Fibre also offer some extras, including a digital home phone line, a TV plan in partnership with Netgem, and a Premium WiFi option for customers who take their 1Gbps plan. However, as good as these are in their own right, they don't quite match up to Virgin Media's package choices.

Here are their lowest priced broadband-only plans side-by-side:.

To get extra services, Virgin Media customers will have to opt for a different package entirely as most options come in pre-made bundles. These can be seen on our Virgin Media broadband deals and Virgin Media TV and broadband deals pages.

All Community Fibre packages can have a home phone added, as well as access the Netgem TV service, however only the 1Gb plan can opt for the Premium WiFi add-on.

Read more about Community Fibre broadband in our review, or get the low-down on Virgin Media broadband here.

Ultrafast broadband

Community Fibre and Virgin Media both offer a choice of ultrafast broadband plans for customers who want a faster download speed.

Virgin Media offer more choice with both their M350 and M500 packages, while Community Fibre offers a 500Mb Fibre Broadband plan.

While Virgin Media's current offer on M500 brings the price down, Community Fibre's 500Mb plan is considerably cheaper, despite the small upfront fee.

In addition, it's worth noting for those who want faster broadband, Community Fibre offer symmetrical upload and download speeds, while Virgin Media generally don't - unless a customer is living in a new Nexfibre connected area, where they can pay an extra £6 per month for symmetrical speeds.

Gigafast broadband

For those who want the fastest broadband they can get, Community Fibre and Virgin Media both offer a gigabit-capable plan to all homes on their network.

Here is the latest pricing for their gigabit deals:

Virgin Media offer the fastest nationally-available average download speed in the UK with their Gig1 plan, which delivers download speeds of 1,130Mb at peak times to at least 50% of their customers, and offers upload speeds of 104Mbps.

Yet even this plan has only asymmetrical uploads, with an average upload speed of just 52Mb.

While Community Fibre's 1Gbps Fibre Broadband plan has a slower average download speed, it also boasts 920Mbps upload speeds as well. This can make a difference to people who use the Internet for home working with project sharing, video calls, online gaming, and any other activity where data is being sent to the Internet as well as retrieved.

Overall, while Community Fibre do offer some great prices on straightforward fast broadband deals, Virgin Media wins this round for offering a wider selection of more comprehensive extra services.

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Broadband speed

Winner: Community Fibre and Virgin Media tie when it comes to broadband speed. Virgin Media have faster average download speeds, yet Community Fibre offers symmetrical upload speeds.

Community Fibre and Virgin Media both offer gigabit-capable broadband speeds across their entire network.

Yet while Community Fibre delivers their broadband using fibre to the home technology, the majority of Virgin Media's network uses coaxial cable to connect a customer's home.

There are some notable differences between Community Fibre and Virgin Media when it comes to broadband speed, yet they each have different strengths, so we've drawn a tie.

The main differences between the providers are:

• Virgin Media have a faster average download speed of 1.13Gb at peak times on their gigabit package, compared to Community Fibre's 920Mb average speed.
• Community Fibre offer symmetrical upload speeds, while Virgin Media's upload speeds are much slower.
• Community Fibre offer the overall fastest speed at 3Gb - however at £50 per month, it's an expensive plan that won't be for everyone.
• Some newly connected Virgin Media customers can now access 2Gb broadband, as well as optional symmetrical upload speeds across all plans.

Community Fibre offer the following average broadband speeds:

While Virgin Media offer these average broadband speeds:

Virgin Media also previously boosted their M100 and M200 plans to M125 and M250, increasing both the average download and upload speeds of the plans. This was rolled out to both new and existing customers.

Upload speeds

Due to the full fibre technology Community Fibre uses they are able to offer symmetrical upload speeds that are as fast as their headline download speeds.

In contrast, because Virgin Media's network uses some coaxial cabling and is a slightly older technology due to their network having been around a lot longer, Virgin Media's upload speeds are usually much slower than their download speeds.

Here are Community Fibre and Virgin Media's upload speeds side-by-side:

It's possible that some Virgin Media customers - those living in newly connected areas - will be able to sign up to their full fibre broadband which now has an optional symmetrical upload speed add-on for £6 per month. This add-on is available on all packages and boosts the upload speed to the same as the download speed.

However, the majority of users may not notice slower upload speeds, as they only affect traffic sent from a user back to the Internet, like uploading files, while most Internet use is receiving traffic (downloading) - such as streaming video or browsing the web.

Where upload speeds may be noticed however is perhaps by people working from home who may need to upload large projects to a shared server, or serious gamers who want the quickest response times for their inputs.

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Router

Winner: Community Fibre offer a more advanced router with the Linksys Velop range than Virgin Media's branded hubs.

Community Fibre offer one of three different routers to customers depending on the broadband speed they choose.

However, all customers receive an advance Linksys or Zyxel mesh router, that's either dual band or tri band for the faster packages.

Virgin Media customers will receive either the Hub 3 or 4, and Gig1 and full fibre customers get Virgin's latest Hub 5 or 5x router which support WiFi 6.

Here are the main routers for each provider:

Like Community Fibre, all of Virgin Media's Hubs support intelligent mesh wi-fi which helps to boost signal around a home and can be seamlessly extended with additional mesh devices.

For gigabit broadband, here are the specifications of Community Fibre and Virgin Media's top of the range routers:

As you can see, even against the Hub 5, the Linksys Velop provided by Community Fibre is likely to be both faster and offer increased coverage thanks to the additional 5GHz channel.

We've also heard of Virgin Media customers who struggle with WiFi coverage, even with the latest Hub 5, and so plenty of Virgin customers choose to use their Hub in modem only mode, and then use an independently purchased router for the best WiFi coverage.

While Virgin Media's Hub 5 was crowned best broadband router, Community Fibre's latest Linksys Velop WiFi 6 is a more advanced router with better customer reviews.

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WiFi guarantee

Winner: Virgin Media's WiFi Max guarantee is available across all their packages and included for free with Gig1, Gig2 and Volt, whereas Community Fibre's Premium WiFi is only available on their gigabit plans.

Community Fibre and Virgin Media both offer a whole home WiFi guarantee that promises a minimum wireless download speed in every room in a customer's home, or their money back.

The WiFi guarantees utilise the mesh technology in their routers to seamlessly extend the WiFi signal by installing extra pods or extenders in rooms furthest from the main router.

These guarantees cost £8 per month with Virgin Media, or £6 per month with Community Fibre, but if they fail to achieve a minimum speed in every room in a home, they promise to refund a customer's money back.

Here are the details of each providers' WiFi guarantee side-by-side:

Community Fibre's Premium WiFi service can only be taken with their 1Gb and 3Gb plans, and it also has a minimum term of 24 months, even if the guarantee isn't met.

Virgin Media's WiFi Max is arguably better however, it's available to add to any of their packages and also comes free with Volt, Gig1 and Gig2 plans. For those who pay for it, the minimum term is also only 30-days so it can be cancelled at any time, which is particularly useful if a customer is unhappy with the performance or no longer needs it.

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Home phone

Winner: Community Fibre charge more for a home phone, but it includes unlimited anytime calls to UK landlines and mobiles, and the overall price is still cheaper than Virgin Media broadband and phone.

Virgin Media offer a more traditional approach to home phone plans, and include weekend calls to UK landlines as standard.

Virgin Media home phone prices look cheaper at first glances, because their additional cost is lower per month, yet because their broadband is more expensive to begin with, Community Fibre are still cheaper overall.

In addition, while Community Fibre charge customers an extra £10 per month for a home phone line, they include free unlimited calls at any time to both UK landlines and mobiles.

Here are their home phone add-ons side-by-side:

Community Fibre's digital voice line is atypical in that it's not possible for customers to dial premium or international calls, although users can receive calls from overseas.

On the plus side, it includes an app that allows customers to make free UK landline and mobile calls from their mobile, even when they're abroad.

For people who want free anytime calls it does work out cheaper to go with Community Fibre, however their restrictions on international calls and lack of call plan options may be off-putting for some customers.

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TV

Winner: Virgin Media is a clear winner for those wanting TV over Community Fibre, offering a comprehensive premium TV service with access to Sky content.

Community Fibre have partnered with Netgem TV to offer a basic TV service that customers can bundle with their broadband package for an extra £10 per month.

For this, customers get:

• Over 230 live channels including 125+ on top of Freeview
• Over 100 apps, including Discovery+, NOW, Netflix, Prime Video, and Hayu
• Watch all live football in the UK (with addition of premium apps)
• 100,000 hours of on-demand content
• Free 4K Netgem TV box (worth £149)
• Record and pause live TV with the Netgem set-top box

In comparison to Virgin Media's TV service however, some customers may find it restrictive. While it has NOW, Netflix and Prime Video, it does miss out on some apps available with Virgin Media, such as Paramount+ and Apple TV+. Some of the included channels are also fairly obscure, for example even under documentaries there's no sign of National Geographic or Discovery.

Overall then, Community Fibre TV is a great option as a recordable set-top box with access to some apps like Netflix, Prime Video and Discovery+, but most people will be disappointed by the lack of big names such as Paramount+ and Apple TV+ and the more integrated viewing experience possible with Virgin Media's TV 360 service.

Read more about Virgin Media TV and their newer streaming service Stream.

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Customer service

Winner: Community Fibre have better reviews on Trustpilot, yet Virgin Media are covered by independent Ofcom reports.

Community Fibre aren't large enough to be covered by Ofcom's customer satisfaction or complaints research, so we don't have any official data to directly compare them against Virgin Media for service.

However, they are the best performing internet service provider on Trustpilot, with an Excellent Trustscore rating of 4.5 out of 5 from over 40,700 customer reviews.

Community Fibre do solicit reviews on their Trustpilot page and try to respond to each one directly. As we'd expect, there are some negative experiences out there, but the overwhelming majority are positive, with 90% of reviewers rating them Excellent.

Virgin Media, on the other hand, have a Bad rating of just 1.6 out of 5 on Trustpilot from over 91,000 reviews. 66% of their reviews are Bad compared to just 9% Excellent and 5% Great.

We also have Ofcom information for Virgin Media showing their customer satisfaction levels and complaint statistics from May 2023:

Virgin Media had above average complaints for their broadband and TV service in Ofcom's latest complaints data, yet they have shown improvement after a peak of complaints in mid 2023.

Yet, the latest Comparing Customer Service report shows Virgin Media scoring less than the industry average across most service quality and complaint metrics, apart from satisfaction with speed, which isn't ideal.

While we don't have details of call wait times for Community Fibre, their broadband call centres are wholly UK-based, while Virgin Media still outsource some of their call handling abroad.

All in all, Community Fibre's ability to maintain a near perfect record on Trustpilot makes them a clear winner over Virgin Media for customer service.

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Availability in London

Winner: Virgin Media has a greater presence in London than Community Fibre, and is also available outside of the capital.

Community Fibre covers around 720,000 premises across London, while Virgin Media covers around 2.29 million homes across the city.

Community Fibre are available in 32 London boroughs, with plans to expand into the remaining borough of Havering soon. Both providers are continuing to expand their networks, and Community Fibre are committed to reaching 2.2 million homes and businesses by the end of 2024.

As you can see from the map below however, Virgin Media are the clear winner for availability in London:

While Virgin Media has much more extensive coverage across the capital, they don't reach into every street by any means and there will be areas where Community Fibre is available when Virgin Media isn't.

As an example, here's a zoomed-in snapshot of current coverage around Streatham:

While there is plenty of Virgin Media coverage around, there are areas where Community Fibre have a presence instead. There are also some overlapping areas.

The reality for Londoners is that they are far more likely to have access to a Virgin Media broadband connection, but Community Fibre are expanding quickly.

Community Fibre's 2024 target of 2.2 million premises is the same as Virgin's current footprint in London. It's also possible that Community Fibre will expand into more areas where Virgin Media is unavailable.

Read more about the best broadband in London.

Outside of London, it's only possible to get Virgin Media, where their network covers almost 16 million premises across the UK.

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Verdict: Virgin Media vs Community Fibre

Overall winner: Community Fibre are our top pick over Virgin Media, because they offer cheaper broadband deals, symmetrical upload speeds, and have a better customer service record.

Community Fibre's prices are less than most other providers in the market, making them hard to beat for sheer value for money.

Their 920Mb broadband deal is considerably cheaper than Virgin Media's Gig1 package, making them a clear winner in terms of pricing for the fastest broadband too.

Another point on the scoresheet for Community Fibre is their out of contract prices are now just £2 more per month than the introductory price. This is notable compared to Virgin Media, whose out of contract prices are much higher.

This low out of contract pricing means Community Fibre are offering real value for money for both new and existing customers, and are overall more affordable than Virgin Media.

What we like most about Community Fibre:

• Competitive pricing across all deals
• Low out of contract pricing
• Excellent customer service reputation
• Advanced Linksys routers

What we like most about Virgin Media:

• More comprehensive TV service with access to Netflix and Sky
• More usable whole home WiFi guarantee
• Faster average download speeds at peak times for gigabit broadband
• Standard home phone plans and features

Yet where Virgin Media really have the edge over Community Fibre is availability. As good as Community Fibre is, their broadband is still only available to a minority of Londoners, so many of those who might like to try the service may find it's not yet available to them.

If a customer is lucky enough to be living in an area with a choice of either Virgin Media or Community Fibre, our first choice would be Community Fibre, unless a customer also wants to bundle TV, in which case Virgin Media become the better choice.

Read more head-to-head guides about Community Fibre vs BT and Virgin Media vs Sky.